Dragon Stop Pickle Shop
by Anime Explorer
Summary: What happens when certain dragons who are in human form and open a pickle shop near the well known guild, Fairy Tail? Their only motive is to spy on their 'children'. Au crack fic by the way.
1. Why Pickles?

A/N: Welcome. So this story is basically just the dragons being weird. Like we tried to say in the summary, it's a crack fic and takes place in an alternate universe. It is utter trash. We apologize if we ruin any image you have painted of these dragons. They're in human form. You'll figure that out pretty fast if you read. Everyone is pretty out of character, but whatever. Also, we made Skiadrum a girl. I acknowledge the fact that it is most likely a male. The two of us decided a female Skiadrum would be better suited for this story. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: We own nothing!

* * *

Somewhere in the town of Magnolia, five figures walked into a building. This building would become their new store. But not just any store, a pickle shop. Yes, they sold pickles.

-O-

"Why the heck are we opening a pickle shop?" Skiadrum swore she might be the only one in this group with some semblance of normalcy. She was the only one who questioned the store;s choice of product. Why pickles?

"It's obvious Dragon 101." Igneel would never cease to have an answer, granted, sometimes these answers were kind of stupid. But they were answers nonetheless.

"Explain." Skiadrum still seemed to be the only confused one.

"Dragons love pickles." Grandina had spoken at this point. It seemed that the others all really did know what was going on.

"It's a fact of life." Metalicana chimed in now.

"Then how did I not know that? I'm a dragon!" Skiadrum was pretty confused. She was just as much a dragon as the others. What was going on?

"You must've never eaten a pickle before." Weisslogia spoke up this time. So Skiadrum really was the only one who couldn't understand the significance of pickles. That much was certain by this point.

"Oh. I guess I haven't." As she thought for a moment, the woman realized that this was true.

"How old are you?" Igneel had snorted upon asking this question. He found it absolutely hilarious that a few centuries old dragon had never eaten a pickle.

"It's so rude to ask a lady that!" Skiadrum exclaimed as Grandina nodded furiously in agreement. It didn't matter that they were dragons. Age was still a sensitive topic.

"You're definitely not a lady." Igneel snorted once again. Weisslogia was laughing quietly as well. Metalicana just looked bored.

"I will cut you." The female dragon glared at the guilty party. The fire dragon really needed to learn how to shut his mouth.

"With metal!?" Metalicana sounded excited at the prospect. He could just picture it now.

"No. You're the only one that can do that. I'm obviously going to use his shadow." Skiadrum was giving him a very frustrated expression. She had come to acknowledge the fact that everyone in the room was ridiculous, but still!

"Riiight."

* * *

"Ugh. Being human sucks. Why are we doing this again?" Metalicana walked into the shop with an angry expression. He looked as though he had been run over by a car. Or you know, whatever this world's equivalent of it was.

"We wanted to see the kids." Skiadrum continued to stock the shelves as she answered his question.

"How does that explain the human thing? I mean I'm all for the pickle shop but why are we human?" Weisslogia chimed in with his own question. He was creating a display.

"How is a group of dragons owning a pickle shop not suspicious?" Grandina was in the corner making sure none of the jars were going to fall from the higher shelves.

"Oh. Right." The white dragon nodded to himself as he continued working on his display.

"I still don't understand about the pickle thing." Skiadrum had stopped her work and turned to face the others. Nothing about this store would ever make sense to her.

"Dragons like pickles!" Igneel was defensive. The whole thing had been his idea after all. Well, the pickle shop. Not the whole 'let's visit our kids' thing.

"And?" Skiadrum continued to wait for a more in depth answer.

"They're dragon slayers." Metalicana had finally gotten over his apparent hatred of cars.

"How does that relate to pickles?" She was still not too sure. Who in their right mind would stop by a store that's only merchandise was pickles?

"Ugh. They have dragon characteristics. They'll stop by sometime to get some pickles." Igneel answered the question as the others nodded approvingly. They just knew the kids would come by.

"Why of all things, pickles?" The question wasn't directed at anyone in particular. Skiadrum was honestly just talking to herself at this point.

"They're really good!" Cue four vigorously nodding figures.

"You know what, give me a pickle." Skiadrum was done with being the confused one. She needed to know just what exactly was so great about these things.

"Yay! You're finally eating one!" Igneel almost knocked over Weisslogia's display in his excitement. Luckily, it was an almost. Anything else and the building would be in pieces.

"I just want to know what all the hype is about." She looked slightly embarrassed. It was almost as though she was crumbling under peer pressure. There was nothing to be proud of about that.

"So?" Four dragons awaited a response. Watching someone eat their first pickle was something none of them had had the opportunity of doing before.

"Oh my God. That is one of the best things I've ever eaten." Skiadrum's eyes widened at the taste. It was like nothing she had ever eaten before.

"One of?" Igneel looked put off by her answer. If this really was her first pickle, then it really should have been the greatest.

"You got me. It's the best thing I've ever eaten!" She continued to stare in awe. Now everything had started to make sense.

"We told you!" Grandina laughed as she said so. She could tell that her friend's questions about the shop were going to come to a standstill.

"Okay, opening a pickle shop was a great idea!"

* * *

"Guys, I put some potato seeds under the front desk." Metalicana casually entered the room. He had been out exploring the town for a short while.

"Why?" Grandina looked up from her work. She was currently pricing their merchandise.

"Gildarts has been in seven times today asking if we sell them. We literally opened a few hours ago." Igneel answered her question. He completely understood where Metalicana was coming from.

"So you got potato seeds for him?" Skiadrum came out of one of the store rooms.

"Yeah." Metalicana responded with a sense of defiance. He would not allow anyone to question his decisions.

"How do you even know his name?" Weisslogia entered the conversation, utterly bamboozled. Was Metalicana a stalker? Or was there some other more logical answer?

"He gave a really outrageous introduction when he came in the first time." The dragon in question responded casually. He honestly couldn't see how this answer could lead to another line of questioning.

"Then where was I?" Weisslogia looked concerned. He really should have heard the man enter.

"You were in the back singing about white." Skiadrum looked up from her meal to answer. Yes, she was in fact eating pickles for lunch.

"Tis' a beautiful element!" He was defensive. So what if white was sort of a weird thing to be the dragon of?

"It's not even an element." Grandina finished her work and went on to get her own lunch. Of course she had to respond to Weisslogia first though.

"It must be! I am the White Dragon!" There was no way it couldn't be. If it wasn't, then Weisslogia's whole life was a lie. Hundreds of years down the drain….

"Doesn't mean it's an element." This was Igneel. He was currently shuffling through the cash register. They had already made quite the profit.

"You're mean!" So what if he sounded like a twelve year old? Weisslogia was perfectly secure with himself.

Suddenly the door were thrown open as the bell rung, signalling a customer. In the room was none other than Gildarts. He was obviously back to ask for potato seeds once again. knowing this, Igneel held up the bag.

"You have potato seeds! Yes! If anyone comes in with a Fairy Tail guild mark, put their expenses on my tab! And I'll pay for those Sabertooth dragon slayers as well! Oh, and that illegal guild made out of reformed criminals!" The man seemed to be listing everyone he could think of in his excitement.

"Uh, okay?" Grandina took note of this, Was everyone in her daughter's guild this easy to please?

"Yes! I'll come in every Friday and pay for everything!" Gildarts continued to twirl around with the potato seeds.

"Thank you, sir." Skiadrum added from her corner. It paid off to be polite to customers you know.

"So are you rich or something?" Igneel let it out from his place behind the counter. He didn't even look embarrassed by what he had just asked.

"Jeez Igneel! You can't just ask people if they're rich!" Metalicana roared. He knew Igneel was ridiculous, but really? Did he just have to ask that?

"Oh, sorry Gildarts!" The fire dragon blushed. Thank goodness he had finally realized just how rude he had been!

"No problem! What did you say your name was again?" The Fairy Tail wizard stopped twirling. He just had to know who the man who had handed him the potato seeds was!

"Uh… He said Iggy. Yeah, my name is Iggy." The dragon quickly tried to cover up what Metalicana had called him. The last thing they needed was for Gildarts to go blabbing about someone named Igneel.

"Such a lovely name!"

And then the man was gone. He was happily skipping down the road as everyone let out a sigh of relief.

"Oooh! That was a close one!" Weisslogia couldn't have been righter.

"Yeah it was! We all need to get some fake names figured out!" Skiadrum was once again being sensible. If they had fake names, then nothing like this would happen.

"Why do it now? It's too early to think about that." Igneel laughed. Yes, laughed. His mood had done a 180 since Gildarts left a few moments ago.

"Fine. We'll just figure it out when we need to." Skiadrum would allow them to mess everything up if that's what they really wanted.

"Sounds like a great idea!" Weisslogia was happy with the idea. It delayed his thinking. And anything that did that must be good.

"Wait. So he just offered to pay for an illegal guild." Grandina still couldn't get over this fact. What kind of guild was her daughter in?

"Eh. From what I gather they're actually pretty cool." Metalicana smiled as he said this.

"What do you mean?" Grandina was once again concerned, Where had Metalicana gotten that idea?

"They take out dark guilds." The iron dragon declared as though it was common knowledge.

"Ah. So how do you know this?" Now Skiadrum was involved. Where was Metalicana getting this information from?

"I'm good at gathering gossip!"

"We have been in town for a total of two days!" Grandina announced.

"So? We have enhanced hearing! It's actually pretty easy to overhear gossip, you know." Metalicana affirmed that he hadn't gone out searching for gossip. There was no way he would ever live it down if he had.

"Sorry. I forgot about that." The sky dragon really did look apologetic. She truly had started to think Metalicana was some sort of creep.

"I do not accept your apology on the grounds that you think I'm stupid." The iron dragon countered.

"No I don't." Grandina had no idea where he got that idea from. She didn't recall ever doing anything to make him think that way.

"Then why do you keep calling me an idiot under your breath?" The man sounded outraged.

"I call everyone an idiot. Even myself. Don't worry about it too much." The woman blushed as she explained. She truly did call everyone an idiot.

* * *

"Hey Lucy! Look, it's a pickle shop!" Natsu was looking directly at the newly renovated building. He obviously wanted to venture inside.

"I am not going into a pickle store right now." The blonde woman gazed at the building, disapprovingly. They had much more important things to do than buy pickles. Her rent money was due, and no jobs involved pickle shopping.

"Fine then. I'll just go tomorrow!" He was already trying to figure out who to bring with him. There was no way he could go into a pickle shop and not share such a great thing with someone else.

"What is with you and pickles, anyway?" She was confused. He always got like this when someone mentioned the food.

"Pickles are the food of the dragons!" Yeah, that explained a lot.

* * *

A/N: So? Please review and tell us what you think! By the way, if you haven't figured it out yet, this account is run by two people. We get together and write. This is why it may seem as though two different writing styles are used. We just pass the computer back and forth and formulate these lovely stories. We apologize for everything though. We really can't write normal stories. Last time we tried something serious, someone ended up jumping off a building because someone stole their zucchini. Yeah… We have issues.

And I mean, as for this story, why not have something humorous in such a tragic time?


	2. Why Iggy?

**A/N: Welcome back. This chapter is actually longer! Once again, I want to make sure everyone here knows that this is in fact a crack fic. It takes place in an alternate universe. As for Skiadrum's gender, well we wanted another female dragon. Long story short, we went with changing the dragon's gender who wouldn't piss off too many people. Normally we would change the one that would piss the most people off but this time we decided to be nice. As for Grandeeney being Grandina, well we've seen quite a few different spellings used. We went with Grandina instead of Grandine due to something you'll see in this chapter. Enjoy and tell us what you think!**

* * *

Somewhere in a cave, a dragon awoke. It was shocked to smell it's number one prey, pickles. Excited, the dragon did one thing that was against everything it stood for. It turned human, Of course things just had to get difficult when he was about to set flight to the pickle source. But no matter. He would get to them sooner or later.

* * *

"Why are all of the displays white? Shouldn't they be colorful to attract more customers?" Skiadrum stared disapprovingly at the decorations.

"White is amazing!" For some reason, Skiadrum still hadn't realized just how obsessed Weisslogia was with the color. And they had spent how many years together now?

"Guys, I think we should put candles on the displays! That way they could look like pickle shrines!" Igneel was already holding up a set of candles. He had obviously been planning this for some time now.

"We are not letting you light anything on fire. And what's the point of having pickle shrines here when most of our customers already have them at home?" Metalicana explained his reasoning. There was no way a pickle shrine display would go over well.

"Then what are we going to do for the displays?" Grandina's question hung out in the open as everyone thought. They needed to make something eye catching.

"I've got it!" igneel was so excited he jumped on top of the counter, knocking over the cash register. Loose change flew everywhere.

"You're picking that up. But please explain." Skiadrum patiently waited for the news of his impending duty to sink in. She was also waiting for an answer. Igneel may not have been the sharpest crayon in the box, but he did have an imagination.

"I think we should get dragon cut out!" The fire dragon's excitement caused fire to come out of his mouth, Luckily they had fireproofed the whole store.

"That's actually a good idea. Now we need a plan." Grandina knew that dragon paintings would catch attention. Everyone would notice the shop.

"Okay, so we need to find an empty field somewhere outside of town. We can all take pictures of each other in dragon form. Then we'll take them to an artist and ask them to paint larger ones onto cardboard so we can make cut outs. Sound good?" Weisslogia rattled off a list of things to do. He didn't explicitly say so, but everyone could tell the cardboard had to be white.

"I think I have the perfect artist in mind."

* * *

"Where is this guy? I thought you said he'd meet us here a while ago." Igneel was impatient. Of course this elusive artist was maybe three seconds late. Our fire dragon seemed to think it had been three years.

"He just showed up. And it hasn't even been a minute. We need to work on developing your patience." Grandina was staring at Igneel incredulously. The fire dragon really did suck at waiting.

"Um…" There stood Reedus Jonah. He looked thoroughly concerned. It was justified too. The dragons sucked at being human.

"Sorry. We're sort of a mess. We just moved to town and all. Now, we were hoping you could create some cardboard cutouts of these photos." Weisslogia handed over the photographs. He hadn't even waited for an answer from the man.

"Um I guess that's manageable. But where did you even get-" The artist was cut off as Igneel shoved his hand over his mouth. A dark aura began to spread out over the scene.

"Don't ask questions. We'll be paying you in pickles." The fire dragon casually removed his hand, his dark aura receding.

"Oh well in that case I'll have these done tomorrow. You should have led with the pickle payment." The artist was already mentally clearing his schedule. These cutouts were high priority.

"Little did Reedus know that he could have gotten free pickles either way. Gildarts would have paid for them." Igneel began speaking to no one. Or so the others thought. He was obviously addressing the audience.

"What?" Reedus looked up at the other man.

"Nothing! I was just talking to myself about pickles. Don't worry about it!"

* * *

The next morning, the cutouts were done. Reedus left with an enormous stash of pickles. The dragons were considering putting the costs on Gildarts tab. It was morally wrong to do so, so they struggled with the decision. But then the bell rang, signaling the arrival of more customers. With the dragon display set up, it only made sense.

"Woah. They weren't kidding when they said the only thing this place sells was pickles." A brunette woman had entered the shop. She was looking around incredulously.

"Welcome. Judging by your attire and guild mark, I'm assuming you're this daughter Gildarts always talks about." Metalicana approached the woman, hoping to help her out.

"How do you know my dad?" The woman, now revealed to be Cana, looked very suspicious. The shop had been open for a few days. Surely her father hadn't been in here too many times.

"He comes in here about eight times a day." Grandina came out of the back room to answer this question. The sky dragon was thoroughly annoyed with the sheer number of times the mage stopped by. Metalicana saw no reason to be annoyed by Gildarts.

"Of course he does. Anyway, do you give out samples? I'm not sure if I've ever gone out of my way to eat a pickle before." Cana looked around once again. The shelves were filled with pickle jars. No sample table was out.

"Yes, we do. But may I ask what you're doing here? Based on your father's stories I would've assumed you were busy drinking at the guildhall." Grandina was the one to hand over the pickle. She had heard plenty of stories and really was confused as to why the woman was present.

"Yeah, about that. The magic council put me on an alcohol ban for the next week. Apparently dropping my contact cards into a barrel of it gets them drunk. And then of course they start going crazy with their limited magic. Long story short, it's the reason the library caught on fire yesterday. I'm trying to find something else to occupy my time with. Hence the shopping."

She blushed as she told her tale. But the card incident answered a lot of questions about the library. You see, the dragons had began to wonder if Igneel had been the one to light it on fire. Of course the dragon had denied it repeatedly. Now they knew he was telling the truth.

"Understandable." Metalicana nodded toward Igneel. The fire dragon was now completely clear of all suspicion.

"Wow. That's actually pretty amazing. How much does a jar cost?" Cana looked at the jars in awe. She had never eaten something so amazing before.

"Oh, they're free for members of Fairy Tail. Don't worry about it. Someone comes in to pay for all of your costs on Fridays." Skiadrum exited the back room now. Why no one questioned why the workers heard everything from that back room, no one would ever know.

"Hm. So I guess I'll be going now." The woman grabbed quite the number of jars as she left.

"If that's what you want, by all means." The fire dragon opened the door for her as she exited the building. They knew she would be back soon enough.

And that was how her addiction to pickle juice began.

* * *

"I'm shocked the kids haven't stopped by yet. I feel like everyone else had heard about the shop by now." Weisslogia looked out the window. He had been hoping to catch a glimpse of the children making their way down the street. Alas, they were not there.

"Well, for one, not all of our kids live in Magnolia. And two, maybe they were out on a job or something." Skiadrum, ever the voice of reason, had an answer. Well, two actually.

"I think they'll be in by the end of the week." Igneel remained a constant source of optimism. Nothing brought him down.

"Same." Grandina thought before agreeing. She knew the kids wouldn't be able to resist for long. The stench of pickles was calling to them. She just knew.

"Yeah, we just have to be optimistic about everything. They'll stop by eventually." Weisslogia seemed to be reassuring himself.

"Well what do we do when they do stop by?" Metalicana sounded frantic. He knew he'd have one of the hardest times keeping it together. He was a terrible actor.

"Try and act natural. Help them pick out a few jars, maybe introduce ourselves. Things like that." Skiadrum chimed in from her spot. She sounded quite confident but anyone would be able to see her nervousness clearly displayed.

"It sounds easy enough." Igneel put in his own two cents. Of course he would. That man just could not keep his mouth shut.

"Key word there is sounds." Metalicana, ever the pessimist, just had to rain on his parade.

"We'll be fine. I mean, even if we do slip up it can't end that badly." Weisslogia was back to his happier self.

"True." Grandina smiled from her spot next to the iron dragon.

"Why do you say that all the time? It does get a little annoying…" Said iron dragon asked her the million dollar question. And of course he added on his own little snarky comment.

"True." The sky dragon smirked as this left her mouth. She knew very well what she was doing.

"Oh dear Lord." Skiadrum face palmed. She knew this wouldn't end well.

* * *

"Come on! Why won't you come with me?" Natsu had been practically begging Gajeel to leave with him. It was actually quite an amusing sight for everyone else in the guild.

"Why would I ever want to go shopping with you?" The iron dragon slayer snorted. In what world would he actually choose to spend time with the other boy?

"But it's a pickle shop!" Natsu's final plea did not go without response.

"Well you should have led with that. Let's go." Gajeel was out of his seat and halfway to the door before anyone else in the guild knew what was happening.

"Can I come?" Wendy had perked up at the mention of pickles.

"Wendy, who in their right mind would ever tell you no?" Natsu grabbed her arm and took off running after Gajeel. They began their trek to the new store.

"Hey!" A wild sting Eucliffe called out and waved from across the road. Next to him was Rogue. But you know, those two were attached at the hip. So it wasn't really that big of a surprise.

"Woah. What are you two doing in town?" Natsu stopped short, the others following suit.

"We heard about some pickle shop." The shadow dragon slayer finally spoke. He had been dragged across the street by Sting who had wanted to speak with the others.

"We decided to check it out. I mean, pickles are amazing after all." The blonde continued to explain what his friend had said.

"You know, we were heading there too." Wendy spoke up from her spot at the back of the group.

"Well the more the merrier!" And with that, the five all continued their walk. It only made sense they would all go to the shop together. After all, who else would understand their taste for pickles? Real dragons? Pft. Like those were actually around anymore.

* * *

A bell rang, alerting the dragons that they had new customers. Five people entered, all heading in different directions. Nodding in unison, the dragons split up, all going to help their customers.

"Hello. Welcome to our store. Is there anything I can help you with?" Igneel was the first to reach his child. He casually started a conversation, hoping nothing would slip out that wasn't supposed to.

"Not right now." The fire dragon slayer continued scanning the shelves before turning to the worker with a smile on his face.

"Well let me know if you need anything. I'm Ign- Iggy Neal Drago. And I mean, you could add an extra Neal on the end if you want!" The dragon mentally cringed. He knew he had screwed up. But alas, it was too late now.

"Oh cool, my name's Natsu." The boy smiled once again before going back to his browsing. Normally he'd be a little friendlier, but the pickles were calling.

"Have a nice day, and do come again!" Igneel called out to the boy as he left with a few jars in hand. The boy went to wait outside for the others.

Meanwhile in another corner of the shop, Grandina walked toward Wendy.

"Welcome. I'm Dina Grand." The woman smiled kindly as she watched the young girl study the merchandise.

"Nice to meet you. I'm Wendy." Looking up from her search, Wendy offered her hand.

"You seem like a sweet girl. Let me know if you need help finding anything." Grandina shook it and proceeded to give the girl a bit of space. She didn't want to come off as creepy.

"Well actually, could you please grab that jar off the top shelf for me? I'm sorry to trouble you but I can't quite reach." The girl looked bashful as she addressed the sky dragon.

"No problem." Grandina handed the girl the jar and went back to the front of the store. "Come again soon!" She called out to Wendy as the girl exited to wait with Natsu.

In another section of the store, Metalicana sidled up to his son.

"Hey. The name's Mal Talica." He put on an air of confidence as he turned to the younger man.

"No." Gajeel didn't even spare him a look. It successfully crushed the confidence Metalicana had tried so hard to muster.

"So uh, is there anything I can help you with today, Gajeel?" He searched frantically for a way to continue the conversation. Everyone else had actually gotten to converse with their children.

"First off, this is a pickle shop. All you sell is pickles. I can't fathom how anyone would need help. Second, I never told you my name." The dragon slayer finally looked up. His expression frightened the dragon. What had happened in the past few years?

"HAHAHAHA! Some crying girl came in here earlier this morning and said something about a guy named Gajeel with piercings." Metalicana quickly tried to cover up his mistake. Sadly, he was terrible at making things up. There was no way the kid would fall for it.

"Stupid Juvia." Gajeel then went back to looking at pickles. Metalicana was in awe.

"Wait, there's actually a girl like that?" He let it slip out. But seriously, what were the odds his kid actually knew some girl like that?

"What?" The dragon slayer looked up from his search once again.

"Oh nothing. Um, bye!" Metalicana watched as his son left, desperately hoping the boy thought he was a creep. Maybe that way he wouldn't catch on to the fact that the store owners were dragons.

Of course while all of this happened, Skiadrum and Weisslogia sauntered over to the same corner. Their kids really were attached at the hip it seems.

"Welcome to the Pickle Shop. I'm uh.. Skai Adrum." Although she had wanted to figure out fake names before something like this happened, Skiadrum had failed to do so. Of course she failed when she tried to come up with a name on the spot.

"And I'm Wesley WHITE! But you can call me Wes." Weisslogia hadn't even put much thought into it. He just said the first thing that came to mind. Good thing he wasn't Igneel.

"Anyway, just let us know if you need help finding anything!" Skiadrum tried to usher Weisslogia away. The man had no filter and would surely let something slip if he remained with the children for too long.

"Oh cool. I'm Sting and this is Rogue. It is so cool that you guys opened a pickle shop. We both love pickles. And it's awesome that your last name is White." But of course his kid just had to start a conversation.

"Wes, please go to the back store room." Skiadrum mentally groaned, knowing there would be some sort of exclamation about white if she didn't get Weisslogia out of there fast enough.

"Why though?" The dragon looked at his companion, confused. He hadn't done anything wrong yet!

"WES!" She yelled. Yes, yelled. Skiadrum had tried to refrain from doing so but there was no other way to get the man to do as she said.

"Fine. There's more white back there anyway." Yup, there it was. The comment about white. Weisslogia needed an intervention or something.

"Sorry about him." Skiadrum smiled as she watched the boys grab some jars and go to join the others.

The dragon slayers left, completely oblivious to who they had just seen. And thank goodness for that too. The dragons were in no way prepared to explain to their children why they had left.

* * *

"Well that could have gone better." Weisslogia spoke the thought that was on everyone's mind. They had all almost slipped up. Well, Metalicana had slipped up. Thank goodness his cover story turned out to be realistic.

"Yeah. Smooth move, Iggy." The iron dragon snorted. Igneel was so close to messing everything up for all of them.

"Like you did any better!" The dragon in question snarled at his friend. Well, could you really even call them friends?

"Excuse me, but Mal isn't bad! You'd actually have to think to figure that one out!" The dragon was right. Mal and Metalicana weren't exactly like Iggy and Igneel. You actually had to think about the Mal one.

"It's the Talica part I was more concerned about. And really, Dina?" Skiadrum looked at the other woman. So yes, Skai hadn't been that great either. But she wasn't going to admit that.

"Hey, I was put on the spot!" The sky dragon jumped to defend herself. She hadn't even come up with the worst name in the bunch!

"Yeah, but your kid's actually smart enough to figure everything out." Igneel popped up from his corner space.

"True." Grandina smiled as this was said. Wendy was still her pride and joy.

"Skiadrum, yours was really bad too. And don't you dare encase me in shadows!" Weisslogia felt the urge to point out the other dragon's failure. After all, she had just pointed out one of the others'.

"Wes was actually a pretty good one." Metalicana let his praise slip out. He immediately regretted thinking a nice thought about the white dragon, but it was too late.

"Why thank you." Weisslogia smiled at the compliment. Metalicana rarely ever let one slip out.

"But my Wendy could still figure you out if she tried." The sky dragon just had to bring up her daughter once again. Once she started talking about Wendy, it was almost impossible to get her to stop.

"Well at least we raised idiots." Igneel had to put this out there. Yes, their kids could be smart. But they were all oblivious.

"True." Bet you can guess who said this.

"Grandina, you have been saying that all week!" Metalicana turned in anger. He was so done with her stupid little catchphrase. Of course he didn't realize the woman was just doing it to annoy him at this point.

"It's not my fault I'm the only one who raised an intelligent child!" Grandina was once again letting her pride show. Wendy was everything she had hoped her daughter would be.

"You left her when she was three." Weisslogia deadpanned. So what if he had done the same?

"So?" Grandina not so patiently awaited a reply.

"It's probably more so that Mystogan kid's fault she's smart." Skiadrum just had to burst her bubble. So what if that Mystogan kid had raised her daughter for a while? And so what if he may have dropped her off in the place that would shape most of her personality? Wendy was still her child.

"She's still my kid." The sky dragon was filled with pride.

"True." Weisslogia had whispered this, as to not anger Grandina. Too bad she was a dragon and could hear things going on in the next town over.

"THAT IS MY CATCHPHRASE!" Grandina jumped onto Weisslogia. She was obviously going to try and claw his face off. And hey, since they didn't have scales in this form, it could actually work.

"So, can I call you Mal Tal for short?" Ignoring the fight behind him, Igneel turned to Metalicana. It was obvious that the fire dragon was getting into the fake names thing.

"Oh my God, Igneel." The iron dragon could only stare sadly. How the mighty had fallen.

* * *

 **A/N: So? I'd really like some feedback. We both would. With every view we get, it brings us great joy. And to our reviewers from last chapter, well we love you guys. We just want to hold you up like Simba in the Lion King and show you off. To our followers and favorites, thank you so much. And to everyone who even clicked on the last chapter, thank you. Thank you for taking time to even click on this ridiculous nonsense.**


	3. What Even Happened?

**A/N: We're baaack! And this time with an even longer chapter! Hopefully the quality or hilarity of the content isn't decreasing too much! Ahem. We must once again note that yes, we are aware Skiadrum should be male. No, we do not care. We changed the gender so deal with it. And as for Grandina, well the spelling was chosen above the rest for a reason. We're sorry, but not that sorry that the characters may appear to be stupid. This is a crack fic. You should've been expecting that. We apologize for ruining any image you may have had of these dragons prior to reading this story. Enjoy!**

 **Disclaimer: We own nothing!**

* * *

The stench of pickles coming from the shop was strong. It overpowered everything else. Or so it did for dragons. If they were near Magnolia, all they could smell was pickles until they ate some. It was a strange phenomenon. And the scent only got stronger each day. Eventually it reached a point where it could have waken the dead. (Hahaha…)

* * *

"Do you think our kids will ever bring in their significant others to meet us?" Igneel sounded almost wistful. He was always dreaming of what things would be like after they told the kids who they were. Or at least, when the kids figured it out.

"Nah." Weisslogia shook his head as he gazed longingly at the white disply. It had once again been condemned to rot in the back room. Poor thing really didn't want to move it back there.

"They probably will!" Grandina became fierce. She knew her Wendy would definitely want her to meet whatever girl or boy she decided was worthy. There was no way the girl wouldn't bring her significant other to meet her!

"Whatever you say then." Skiadrum rolled her eyes as she turned to look out the window. It was the one day a week when the shop was closed. And it was raining. There was nothing to do but sit inside and talk.

"I bet my son's dating the toughest, tallest girl! She's probably amazing!" Metalicana decided to start a trend. Yes, they would all share their thoughts on who their child would be with. Of course his son would have to date a tough kid. There was no way Gajeel would ever be happy with someone nice!

"I bet my son is dating a girl with _WHITE_ hair!" Weisslogia sounded excited. Of course the ideal mate for his son would be someone with white hair. The dragon was absolutely obsessed with the color. It was actually getting a bit unhealthy.

"Are you serious?" Skiadrum seemed the only one concerned by what Weisslogia had just said. Everyone else just continued living without a thought.

"My little Wendy is too young to date." Grandina looked both stern and disappointed. She obviously wanted Wendy to be dating, just not at her current age.

"Well I bet my son is dating the sweetest girl." Skiadrum just had to join in. She knew that her son would never date someone who wasn't kind. To be honest, Skiadrum had screwed him up a bit as a kid. She could be quite sadistic at times. Poor Rogue would never be able to deal with anyone who wasn't sweet. It would utterly destroy his mental health if his significant other wasn't.

"I don't have faith that my son will actually find someone." Igneel had chosen to go with the honest route. Sure, it wasn't the nicest thing to say. But really, he didn't want to get his hopes up. Natsu was a bit… different.

"Jeez, Igneel." Weisslogia turned to look at the fire dragon. That comment really wasn't the best thing to say. Couldn't Igneel have humored them for a while?

"I know. There's a reason I'm not in the running for father of the year." The fire dragon sighed. He knew he would have to explain himself sooner or later. What parent didn't have faith in their child's ability to attract others?

"I thought was because you abandoned your son at age ten." Grandina said this with a smirk. It was a bit of a sore point with the dragon in question. He had always been more sensitive about the fact that they had had to leave than the rest.

"YOU DID TOO!" The yell was followed by an accidental releasing of fire. Yup, Grandina sure had struck a chord. Of course tomorrow they would act as though this had just been a joke.

"Excuse me but Wendy was five." The sky dragon looked offended that Igneel had not remembered this fact. Her glare indicated this as well.

"Yeah, you're not winning mother of the year anytime soon." Metalicana snorted from his corner. No one in the room would be winning these awards anytime soon. Heck, Skiadrum and Weisslogia had taken quite a sadistic approach to leaving their children. Honestly, what part of their plan even sounded like a good idea? Hey, let's convince our kids that we're dead because we have to leave to go do some dragon stuff? Or was it the whole 'Hey, how about we let the kids think they killed us!' part? Seriously, where was the appeal in this plan? Their kids were obviously a bit screwed up because of it.

* * *

"So about our names. Do you think we could get away with changing them at all? I mean, these are super obvious." Skiadrum was the one to start this meeting. Someone was bound to broach the subject eventually. And of course she would be the first to bring it up.

"What do you mean? No one will ever figure me out!" Igneel gazed proudly at nothing. It was as though he was trying to show off to an audience.

"Igneel, you just called yourself Iggy. That's not very creative." Metalicana always rained on his parade. Igneel would never get to enjoy himself as long as the iron dragon was around.

"Still. The kids won't figure it out unless I tell them!" The fire dragon was still filled with pride. He truly believed he would have to reveal his identity. Poor guy didn't realize just how obvious it was.

"They'll figure it out for sure. Honestly, couldn't you have just gone with Neal? I mean, it would've been a quick fix to the name issue." Grandina entered the conversation. She was always choosing times like this to speak up.

"I still think mine is okay. You're all the ones we need to worry about!" Igneel continued to stand by his claims. Nothing would make him understand just how obvious he had been.

"No way. Yes, Skai is literally part of my name, but it's still a tad different." Skiadrum defended herself. Sure, she could have thought of something better. But honestly, she had been put on the spot. It could have been a lot worse.

"It's exactly like Iggy. You literally spent two seconds coming up with it." Grandina, much like Metalicana, constantly rained on everyone's parade.

"You're no different!" Igneel and Skiadrum yelled this in unison. There was a strange silence afterward. It was the first time she had actually agreed with Igneel.

"Excuse me, but Dina is quite far off from my real name." The sky dragon glared at the others in attendance. So, everyone but Weisslogia. That man was still in the back room singing about white.

"Yeah, but it's still not as good as mine!" Metalicana was just as proud of his name as Igneel. He just did a better job of containing himself.

"Mal Talica? Honestly, the first name was good. The last name just gives it away." Grandina would not tolerate anyone praising themselves after she had just been denied the right. What made them all think their names were better than hers?

"But this way I can call him Mal Tal!" Igneel chimed in joyfully. He just loved saying that.

"Calm down Igneel." Skiadrum acted as a mother once again. It had practically become her job to calm the fire dragon.

"Anyway, Talica gives away a lot." Grandina continued to speak, ignoring Igneel's comments to the best of her ability.

"I know that. I want the kid to have a possibility of figuring this out." Metalicana found himself on defense once again. Why was everyone so mean?

"So why didn't you just go with the last name Cana?" Grandina continued her spiel again. By this point, she was completely disregarding what the iron dragon had said.

"That answer is obvious!" Igneel tried to support Metalicana. Of course he was met with two different glares. Honestly, he just needed to figure out when to shut up.

"No it's not! Your name is Metalicana! It's part of your name. It makes sense." The time the sky dragon did factor in Igneel's comment. She knew Metalicana may have been thinking the same thing as the fire dragon.

"Well Gildarts has a daughter named Cana." The iron dragon seemed to think this was enough explanation. Sadly, it was not.

"And?" The three other dragons all awaited an answer. They were completely befuddled by Metalicana's reasoning. What did Gildarts kid have to do with anything?

"He talks about her everytime he comes in here. Which, by the way, is eight times today." The man once again thought this would be ample explanation. But alas, it was not.

"That means nothing regarding your fake last name!" The shadow dragon was the one to speak this time around. She had been trying to stay out of the conversation. But now her curiosity had reached a new high.

"I just feel like it would be weird!" Metalicana was obviously done talking about the issue. And so, everyone left him alone.

Although they all realized this, no one said anything about Weissolgia's name. They all knew he didn't deserve too much grief. After all, it was the best thing any of them had come up with. Wesley White was much further from Weisslogia than any of the other names could hope to be. Well, from their own respective dragon's name of course. Mal Talica may have been distant from Weisslogia, but it was a dead give away for Metalicana.

* * *

"Hey you're back!" Metalicana was pleasantly surprised to see Gildarts waltz into the shop. The iron dragon had been in charge of the cash register that day.

"Yeah, I forgot to pay off the tab last time I stopped by." The Fairy Tail mage didn't even seem the slightest bit embarrassed by this.

"Ah. So how're you doing then?" Metalicana took his answer in stride and proceeded to make small talk.

"Good. The guild is great. Although, my daughter does keep disappearing." And Gildarts turned it into a full blown conversation. Good going dude.

"She must be doing something behind your back." The iron dragon hadn't thought to filter what he had said. Only now did he realize it may have sounded insensitive.

"I know that and I worry." Gildarts sighed heavily and closed his eyes.

"Ah, all kids do things behind their parent's backs. I know this for a fact." Metalicana smiled as he was hit with a stream of nostalgia. Ah yes, those were the days.

"Got a kid yourself then?" The question shook him out of his flashback.

"A son. But I haven't seen him in years." He answered honestly, well sort of. Metalicana had seen Gajeel a few weeks ago, but still.

"Hm."

"So I guess you'll be taking some more potato seeds." The iron dragon knew the conversation had ended. He pulled out a bag of seeds and offered them.

"You know me so well." The mage smiled as he accepted and then proceeded to exit the store.

"Why don't you ever talk to me like that!?" Igneel looked like he was about to cry. Metalicana was thoroughly confused.

"What are you talking about? I talk to you!" The iron dragon had to ask. Nothing made all that much sense right now.

"But not like you talk to Gildarts! It's like you don't even care!" The fire dragon was on a roll. All of his pent up anger toward Metalicana was coming out.

"We're not in a relationship." The other man said this without much emotion. He would probably never understand what was wrong with Igneel.

"Uh!" Some fire left the man's mouth.

"Calm down. I'll be forced to abandon you as a friend if you don't stop." Metalicana found Igneel's behavior to be quite annoying. There was no reason for him to be acting like a jealous wife.

"Come and just kill me then!"

"Igneel, you're a freaking mess." The iron dragon may or may not have launched a hit at his friend(?).

"Heavy metal broke my" Two beats. "Heart!" The fire dragon sung with so much passion. It was quite beautiful really.

"Igneel, stop saying that every time I punch you!" Metalicana was done with this conversation. The singing was not helping his mood.

"I don't say it every time! You punch me way too many times for that!" Igneel was quite adamant about this fact. Metalicana truly did punch him often.

"You say that like it's a bad thing." To Metalicana, it wasn't. He was more of a tough love kind of guy.

"It is. You break my heart everytime you do. I just tear up thinking about the bromance we could have if you would just stop." Igneel was obviously still jealous of Gildarts.

"You know there's a reason you don't have any friends." The iron dragon realized this was harsh. And that was probably why he said it in the first place.

"Heavy met-"

"STOP SAYING THAT!" The yell wasn't too loud. It was actually more of a loud form of speech.

"Okay bro." Igneel sniffed. He looked like he was crying.

"WE ARE NOT HAVING A BROMANCE!" Metalicana roared. Yes, he actually roared.

"Well then, heavy metal-" Igneel took a deep breath before continuing.

"I WILL STAB YOU! WITH METAL!"

* * *

"I smell pickles. You know, I really want some right now. Pickles are literally the most amazing thing in Fiore. They're like heaven, only food. Why do I smell so many pickles? It's like someone has a huge collection. You know, I heard there's a pickle shop in Magnolia."

"Erik stop it. We'll make a stop in Magnolia so you can visit this elusive pickle shop."

* * *

"I just stopped by to tell you guys I know you're dragons. Oh and Erik would not shut up about pickles. You should have heard him." A Jellal Fernandes had entered the quaint little shop. And yes, it was the original Jellal. Following him were two other men.

"Cool. But why is he here?" Weisslogia looked pointedly at Laxus. He knew who was supposed to be involved in what guild. The lightning dragon slayer was definitely a part of Fairy Tail.

"Hey! I'm sort of a reformed criminal… In a way!" Laxus was quick to defend. Yeah, he didn't belong to Crime Sorciere. But that didn't mean he couldn't hang out with them.

"Yeah. And we were having a club meeting." Erik helped to protect his whatever Laxus was, from being bothered. Yeah, it was a bit weird for the man to be there. So what?

"Cobra and I feel for each other." The lightning dragon slayer may or may not have been thinking about said club. Stupid Gajeel was such a traitor. He just had to go and get himself a cat, didn't he?

"Whatever." Metalicana rolled his eyes.

"Anyway, Lahar is stalking me. I'm assuming you know who that is to some extent. But if you see him, please kick him out. Also, don't tell him I was here." Jellal cringed upon mentioning his follower. Lahar may have developed a small obsession with the bluenette. Okay, small was the understatement of the century.

"Yeah. And Angel wanted you to know that if she's in here you should make sure some guy named Dan stays far, far away." Erik, also known as Cobra, relayed the request his friend had sent with him. Sorano hadn't explained the whole Dan thing. It really left some unanswered questions. I mean, who was this so called Dan anyway?

"Okay. But this is really just a pickle shop." Skiadrum was always reminding people of this. Sure, they may have involved themselves in some things that were not directly related to pickles. But it was still just a pickle shop!

"If you want Erza to stop by, you should start selling strawberry cake." Jellal added this as an afterthought. He looked as though he seen a ghost.

"Fine. I mean we already sell potato seeds to Gildarts anyway." Igneel was the one to agree to this. A little extra business never hurt anyone.

"Good. Now I can hear Lahar so I'm just gonna…" That explained the facial expression he had made. The poor man was obviously trying to escape his pursuer.

"Bye! Stop by again sometime soon!" Igneel waved very flamboyantly as the trio left.

"Hey have seen any of the like eighty seven Jellals. I mean, I'm looking for the real one but…" Not even a full minute passed before Lahar made his grand entrance. Jellal had been right about the stalking.

"And why are you looking for this dude?" Weisslogia tried to make small talk.

"Uh….. Lahar is unavailable now!" The man seemed to go into shock upon being questioned. He quickly pushed up his glasses and made the fastest exit possible.

"Where is Lahar? He literally broke out of prison to stalk Jellal." The doors to the store were flung open once again. Doranbolt was standing in the entranceway, clearly out of breath. He had been running after something for quite a while.

"We have no idea." Grandina answered as she watched the man start to freak out. He seemed to change personalities.

"Ugh. I need to know!" With this, Doranbolt channeled his inner Mest and began to chew on Metalicana's head. The iron dragon looked absolutely livid.

"Wait, is your name Doranbolt? Cause we really need a bolt for that door!" Igneel was back at it with his puns. That man just couldn't control himself, could he?

"Cut the puns. I really need to know if you saw Lahar." The man gazed desperately at the more reserved dragons. He had realized pretty quickly that they would be the only ones who would offer an actual answer.

"Yeah. But what do you mean he broke out of prison? I thought he worked there." Skiadrum, ever the worrier (not), patiently waited for an answer. She knew this had the potential to be quite the long story.

"Oh he does. He just wanted to channel his inner Jellal so he broke out of one of the high security cells to see if he could." Doranbolt looked embarrassed. He had spent quite a bit of time around Lahar and clearly had not expected his friend(?) to do such a thing.

"Oh well that's nice. And Lahar said he was unavailable so…" Grandina offered the answer. She smiled as she said this, alerting the man that his greatest fear had been realized.

"He jumped out the window, didn't he?" A loud sigh accompanied this statement. It seemed that window jumping was becoming a bit of a hobby for the other man.

"Uh huh."

* * *

Just before the store closed, there was one last customer. A woman with her hair pulled under a cap and sunglasses adorning her face entered. Her outfit was completed by an oversized hoodie. No one would suspect her real identity.

"Do you guys have my usual?" Yes, this customer had been coming in every other night for the past week. The young woman seemed to have developed some sort of addiction to the merchandise.

"Of course. Do come again soon!"

* * *

 **A/N: So? We'd really appreciate some feedback! And if anyone is offended by the way a character is portrayed, please notify us. We can try to make changes if need be! Anyway, we should be back again before the end of the month, so stay tuned!**


	4. Jade, Really?

**A/N: To the reviewer who left that comment about Lucy and Levy going to the shop, well you basically predicted what we had planned for this chapter! You're awesome! But back to the regularly scheduled author's note: So you'll see what that joke about raising the dead is about this chapter! Sorry, this is our story so some weird things will happen. We apologize for ruining an view you may have and about the dragons. We would also like to note once again, that yes, Skiadrum is most likely a male. We have made Skiadrum a female in this story mostly because we could. And as for Grandina's name, well we picked that spelling for an obvious reason. Thank you for reading!**

* * *

A dragon, the one from chapter two, made its way across the land. It was taking forever to get to where he needed to be. Honestly, why couldn't he have just waited to turn human until he was at the shop? I mean, public transportation was horrible. And yes, he did get motion sickness. It was unbearable. But he wasn't even halfway to the shop yet. It was going to be one long journey.

* * *

"Wes?" The shadow dragon was taking advantage of the time she had alone with her old friend. They hadn't been able to have a serious conversation with each other for quite some time now.

"Yeah, Skai?" The white dragon looked to the woman. He patiently awaited her question.

"Do you think I'm a sadist?" Skiadrum cringed slightly at the word.

"Sometimes I feel like you are. I mean, you do have some sadistic tendencies." Weisslogia had decided to go the honest route. I mean, there was no point in hiding anything from her. If he didn't tell her, someone else was bound to.

"Such as?" The woman was concerned. If there was actually a moment Wes could pinpoint where she had taken a sadistic approach, well her worst fear had come true.

"That time with the kids." The dragon did not feel the need to go into great detail. She would know exactly what he was talking about.

"Oh. That was definitely your idea!" Skai was on the defense. The thing with the kids was most definitely sadistic.

"Nope. You just managed to talk me into it by bribing me." The other dragon snorted slightly at his friend's quick pass of the blame.

"With what?" The woman was confused. Last time she had checked, it was quite hard to get Weisslogia to do things he did not wish to do.

"Something white. I don't remember what it was exactly." Weisslogia wasn't even embarrassed at this point. It was common knowledge he got a bit weird when it came to that particular color.

"Ah. But it couldn't have been my idea!" Skiadrum refused to admit defeat.

"It was. Like I would ever come up with an elaborate plan like that." It wasn't often that the white dragon referenced his lack of strategic thinking. He was actually quite terrible with coming up with plans.

"You could. And you did."

"SKIADRUM, YOU ARE THE ONE WHO WANTED TO MAKE OUR KIDS THINK THEY KILLED US!" A random sheet of light shot through the room. Wes had reached a point where his lovely powers were a bit out of control. He wasn't angry. No, he was just frustrated.

"Can't you just humor me for one minute?" Skai knew it was the truth. And so, she really did just want someone to humor her for a few moments.

"Nope." Weisslogia smirked.

"Fine. I'll admit it wasn't the best idea." The shadow dragon was finally forced to acknowledge her less than perfect decision.

"You think? I mean, how in the world are we supposed to explain our life to the kids?" The white dragon was honestly more concerned with how the whole explanation was going to go than the mental and emotional trauma inflicted upon his son.

"I'm not sure, okay."

"And I thought you were the smart one!"

"I am. I just have bad days every once in awhile." Skiadrum was very big on this point. And she was right. Everyone had bad days once in awhile.

"Whatever you say." Wes rolled his eyes as he made his way to the counter. The shop would be opening soon.

* * *

"Hey, a new customer!" Igneel's joyful shout brought the other four dragons out of the room they were in. A new customer was a big deal. Especially if it was the first one of the day.

"Sup. The name's Jade." A short-ish man with green hair entered the shop.

"Jade?" Igneel was not trying to be particularly rude. But Jade just wasn't a common name in these parts. Well, for a male anyway.

"As in Jay Dee." The man sputtered for a moment before uttering this statement.

"Ah. Well it sounded like you said Jade." Metalicana chimed in from the corner. He was always the reason they lost some customers.

"I um.. I didn't." The man looked completely at loss for what he should do.

"Wait a second, Zirconios? I thought you were dead!" Igneel had connected the dots before anyone else. They would not be able to call him an idiot for at least an hour now!

"Oh, I was. The overwhelming smell of pickles is actually raising us dragons from the dead." The man, no, the dragon answered. He knew this whole thing would be hard to explain. That's why he had tried (and failed) to use a fake identity.

"Oh. Thats… Interesting." Skiadrum was shocked. She had no idea how to react to this new news.

"Yeah, we were all pretty confused, it was like waking up after a really long nap." The dragon continued to explain the situation. Being dead was so.. weird.

"Anyway, I didn't know you had a human form." Weisslogia tried to make conversation. He wasn't too keen on letting the dragon leave right away. Who knew what he would get up to.

"We all do. I just absolutely hate mine. Humans are food after all." Zirconios had confirmed their fears. He was still big on letting the human race die. Joy.

"No eating humans or we'll sick our kids on you!" Igneel shouted from his spot behind the counter. He just knew his son would be able to stop the big old dragon if really necessary.

"Fine. Just give me some pickles." The jade dragon rolled his eyes at the other man.

"Will do. I mean, what else do you think this pickle shop is for?" Igneel smiled as he passed a jar over to his fellow dragon.

* * *

"Gildarts!" Metalicana cried out in his excitement. His favorite customer had come in today. Finally.

"Mal!" Gildarts was just as excited to see Metalicana as the man was to see him.

"I KNEW YOU TWO WERE HAVING A BROMANCE BEHIND MY BACK!" Igneel slammed open the door to the back room. He had never let go of his jealousy toward Gildarts.

"So what if we are?" Metalicana was pretty sure he and Gildarts weren't having a bromance as Igneel called it. But he would do anything to make the fire dragon mad. So…

"I can't believe you would do this to me! Mal, I thought what we had was special." Igneel was actually crying now. That man was so emotional…

"You mean the way I used to punch you every time you talked to me? Or the way that I ignored you eighty percent of the time." What Metalicana spoke was the truth. The two had a rocky relationship, not a bromance.

"MAL!"

"IGGY!"

"I'M NEVER CALLING YOU MAL TAL AGAIN!" The cry was filled with outrage. Thank goodness Gildarts was preoccupied or he would have noticed the flames that left Igneel's mouth.

"GOOD!" Metalicana had just achieved his dream. Mal Tal was a terrible nickname.

"I guess I'll just leave you two to it again." Igneel snorted sadly as he walked away from the other two men.

"Just us and the potato seeds." Metalicana smirked as he said this. Igneel was sure to be angry that potato seeds were included when he was not.

"Wait, Mal, you must realize Gildarts will never love you more than potato seeds." The fire dragon turned around quickly to address his friend.

"I know. We already went through this talk." So maybe Metalicana and Gildarts were having a bromance. Why else would they have had this conversation before?

"It's true. I told him on day one potato seeds were my number one." Gildarts smiled at the bag of seeds he was holding.

"Wait. Even before your daughter?" Igneel was confused. What was going on with this man and potato seeds?

"There's a reason I'm a potato farmer in Edolas." Was all Gildarts said as he began walking toward the door.

"Edolas?" Metalicana looked concerned. What exactly was Edolas anyway?

"Ah….. Nothing! Well, I must be going now!" Gildarts practically sprinted the rest of the way out of the shop.

"Igneel, why do you always scare off my potential friends!"

"I do not!" Igneel looked upset. How dare Metalicana accuse him of such a thing!

"Do too!" The iron dragon slayer fired this back.

"Nuh huh!"

"Yeah huh."

"Heavy metal broke my-" Igneel was back to his old habits, it seemed.

"For god's sake, stop doing that!" Metalicana still hated everything about this situation.

"Only if you agree to a bromance." Igneel sniffed as he stared the other man dead in the eyes.

"Fine." The iron dragon cringed as the word left his mouth. He knew he would regret this.

"Yes! Mal Tal and Iggy Neal, together forever!" Igneel jumped up and down happily. He even pulled confetti out of thin air to throw around.

"I thought you weren't calling me that anymore." Metalicana groaned as the dreaded nickname left Igneel's mouth. The fire dragon could only smile.

"It's too perfect not to!"

* * *

"Hey do you guys have an extra clothes in here?" A random Natsu Dragneel popped his head into the shop. He was dragging a blonde woman behind him.

"This is a pickle store. But why?" Weisslogia looked stern but then his expression changed to one of wonder. He was curious as to why this kid needed some extra clothes.

"Oh, Lucy lost her clothes on our last mission. And I sort of want my jacket back." Natsu smiled as he said this. It was as though he found nothing about his statement strange. The girl visibly cringed. She was clearly upset.

"This is a pickle shop!" Skiadrum chimed in. She was very shocked that someone would come in here and ask for clothes.

"Yes this may be a pickle shop but we happen to have an exact replica of the jacket your girl is wearing!" Igneel pulled an article of clothing out from under the counter.

"Iggy, what the heck?" Skiadrum honestly should have expected this by now. But she was still in shock.

"Oh yes, sorry. I'm being rude. I should introduce myself to this young lady. I'm Iggy Neal Drago. And you can add an extra Neal on the end if you want." Igneel ignored everything coming out of Skiadrum's mouth. He was too preoccupied with speaking to his son and his friend.

"Iggy I swear-" The shadow dragon was completely done with being ignored. She was seriously considering blowing her cover and attacking Igneel with his own shadow.

"Well we have to get back to the guild, bye!" Natsu pulled Lucy outside of the shop.

The two walked for a few moments before Lucy spoke.

"Oh my God."

"What?" Natsu turned to his friend. She looked as though she had just discovered something life changing. And perhaps she had.

"One, why did you take me to a freaking pickle shop to get clothes? I could've just called Virgo! And second, oh my God." Lucy's expression changed to one of anger for a few moments. The whole walking into a random store and asking for clothes thing wasn't something she would have done by herself. It only made sense she would be angry at Natsu for that. As for the second thing, well her face had gone back to it's previous expression.

"What?" The pinkette continued to look at the girl, waiting for her to elaborate.

"I'll just let you figure it out by yourself." The blonde sighed deeply. If Natsu didn't figure everything out within a decent amount of time, she would tell him. But not now.

"Lucy, what are you talking about?" Natsu was still confused.

"Like I said, you figure it out yourself."

Meanwhile inside the store, the dragons were crowded around the shop window. They were busy watching the two walk away. The others were also discussing the girl.

"What kind of girl is your son dating!?" Skiadrum looked extremely concerned. She would be utterly crushed if her son came in asking for some clothes for his 'friend'. So it made sense she was confused by Igneel's reaction to the situation.

"A pretty one." Weisslogia answered the woman's question without thinking about who it was directed at. He did this often.

"Wes!" Skiadrum's outraged cry rang throughout the shop.

"Well it's true! No one can deny that fact there. If only she had white hair…" Weisslogia went off into his mental wonderland where the color white reigned supreme. So basically the world was covered in snow there.

"Uh. Well, let's just ignore him right now." Grandina saw the way the man was gazing into nothing and felt it best they leave him be.

"I second that notion." Skiadrum was done dealing with Wes today as well. It wasn't that she hated him. He was just so… obsessed with white. She much prefered darker colors.

"Now, what kind of girl do you think she is?" Grandina turned to Igneel. She asked the question with a lot less suspicion than Skiadrum had used.

"Shut up! I'm trying to listen to their conversation!" The fire dragon glared at the others as he zeroed in on what his son was saying.

"Got anything?" Metalicana had become uncharacteristically involved in the whole situation.

"It appears she's a celestial mage." Igneel had heard the comment about Virgo and used context clues.

"Could be worse." The iron dragon slayer then went back to whatever he was doing before the whole thing.

"But the clothes thing. How does one lose their clothes like that?" Skiadrum was still asking some tough questions.

"HAHAHA!" A random bout of laughter came from the back room. Well, one of the back rooms.

"Zirconios! I thought you had left!" Grandina shouted to the man who had just entered the front. The dragons had thought he left town hours ago.

"I came back to restock. Now, that's the girlie who I almost ate back in the day." Zirconios was clearly immersed in a sense of nostalgia.

"So you got rid of her clothes once?" Grandina knew what sort of strange things the jade dragon did to those whom he was about to ingest.

"Yup. The ugly thing flew through the air stark naked." The dragon grabbed a jar of pickles as he sat down to finish the discussion.

"Was she shocked?" Skiadrum was actually interested in this answer. Maybe it would help ease her questions.

"Seemed more used to it than anyone else I had ever eaten before." Zirconios grabbed another jar and started to walk toward the shop door. He was leaving to return to wherever he had chosen to stay.

"Again, what kind of girl is she!?" Skiadrum was scared again. What kind of person was used to losing their clothing!?

"Guys, my son found someone. He actually did it!" Igneel was crying tears of joy. Natsu, against all odds, had managed to secure himself a girlfriend. It was cause for celebration.

"Oh yeah, I forgot you didn't have faith in him." Grandina smiled at this. Igneel had been the only one to think his kid was going to die alone. And now he was the first to come in with a significant other.

"My daughter in law is beautiful! And the grandkids will be even more adorable!" The fire dragon was on a tangent now. He was lost in thoughts of being a grandfather.

"Calm down there. We're not even sure if they're dating." Grandina tried to settle the man.

"They are." Igneel was having none of it.

"I know." Grandina sighed as Igneel once again began talking about how cute his grandbabies would be.

* * *

"Oh so this is the pickle shop you keep talking about?" A small girl sporting some messy blue hair entered the shop.

"Sure is Shrimp." Behind her was a much taller man with dark hair.

"Don't call me that!" Levy McGarden snapped at her companion.

"But you are a shrimp." Gajeel smirked as he watched the young woman struggled.

"Just shut up and help me reach the pickle jar on that shelf!" Levy was forced to admit defeat seeing as she was not able to reach the top shelf. You see, the only pickle jars of that particular type were placed up high.

"Told you." The man pulled the jar down with ease. Gajeel snorted at the outraged look on Levy's face.

"Ugh." The two left quickly afterward. They had not been in the shop for much time. But it was long enough for assumptions to be made.

"Tallest girl, huh?" Igneel was the first to turn on Metalicana. It was strange considering the conversation the two had had earlier, but whatever.

"Shut up." The iron dragon growled at his friend. Why had he just had to voice his thoughts on the perfect girl for his son?

"Oh and I do recall hearing toughest." Grandina snorted as well. She was always joining in on banter such as this.

"Shut up!" Metalicana glared at the others, hoping they would not say anything more.

"BUT SHE WAS AMAZING!" Too bad for his Weisslogia loved to talk. The white dragon had found the small girl endearing, you see.

"YES!" Skiadrum and Igneel shouted their agreement.

"TRUE!" Grandina voiced her opinion as well. Apparently it had taken Levy only a few moments to secure the support of the dragons.

"What the heck?" Metalicana was thoroughly confused by the antics of his friends. One second they were teasing him, and the next they were in awe of the subject of that teasing. Such strange folk they were.

* * *

A fairly large group of people soon entered the store. They were from the guild Lamia Scale. You see, Lyon had gone to Magnolia to um.. not visit Gray, he swears! And the others had just sort of followed him. The mage had heard about this shop and decided to check it out for himself.

"Hey! Is that? Yes, You have white hair! You get ahuge discount!" Wes had jumped up as soon as the new customers had entered. He had seen Lyon's hair and reacted as quickly as possible, completely missing the way the bald man accompanying the boy winced.

"My hair is not white it's si-" Lyon began, but then soon realized that the word 'discount' had been mentioned. "Wait, a discount?" Lyon's voice showed a slight tint of excitement for this supposed discount.

"Yeah." Weisslogia waited patiently for the young man's reply.

"How big of a discount?" Lyon awaited an answer. Maybe the discount would be good.

"Eighty percent off." The white dragon said this and then proceeded to sigh wistfully. He was off thinking about white again.

"YES I DO HAVE WHITE HAIR! IT'S TOTALLY NOT SILVER!" Lyon jumped up and shouted this as loud as possible. People all over Magnolia had probably heard his announcement.

"You were literally just complaining about that before we walked in here." Yuka Suzuki was one of those who had gone to Magnolia with Lyon. And yes, Lyon had been lecturing Toby on how his hair was silver and not white right before they entered the shop.

"Shut up, Yuka. My hair is as white as your eyebrows are huge." Lyon thought quickly and responded with a great analogy.

"They're not that big!" Yuka almost screamed. Why was everyone always hating on his brows? He needed to find some new friends or something…

"Yes they are. They're as big as Sherry's obsession with love." Jura chimed in from the side of the store. He was reading the label on one of the jars.

"Or Chelia's crush on Lyon." Sherry chimed in from her corner as well. She too was reading labels.

"Wait, what?" Lyon turned around to face Sherry. She blushed, realizing what she had just said.

"Lyon just forget anyone ever said that." Sherry frantically tried to get the man to ignore what she had just said. Her cousin's feelings did not need to be broadcasted to the very person they were for.

"Fine. But like I was saying, my hair is so white that even the great Snow White is jealous." Lyon turned back to Wes. He chose to follow Sherry's request and ignore everything he just heard.

"I am not jealous of your stupid hair!" A random Cobra popped out of the back room. Crime Sorciere was spending a lot of time in there recently.

"What?" Lyon was confused by Cobra's involvement in what he had just said.

"What." Cobra stared back, showing no semblance of emotion. He was clearly acting as though he had not said anything before.

"Erik, control yourself." Jellal exited the back room as well. Why the heck were so many people in the back room anyway?

"Oh hey, I remember you. How's it going?" Cobra looked back at Lyon as though seeing him in a new light. Recognition was clear.

"What are you doing here?" Lyon waited for Cobra's answer. He wasn't too sure what was even going on at this point.

"Ah. My guild's in town." The dragon slayer answered the question and stood quietly.

"Yeah, he's with us now." Jellal backed up Cobra's answer with a clarifying statement. Honestly, if a criminal was out of jail people should really just assume they were with Crime Sorciere.

"Oh. Well um, what are you guys doing in the store?" Lyon turned to the bluenette. He knew Jellal would give a valid reason.

"I'm hiding from Lahar. If any of you tell him I'm in here I will wipe out your guild." The man said this in an ominous tone. He had been running from Lahar for weeks now.

"He is completely serious." Cobra chimed in from his spot next to the man.

"MACBETH, YOU CAN NOT SLEEP INSIDE A PICKLE JAR!" A shout came from the back room. Like I said, everyone was back there nowadays.

"Uh oh. Looks like I need to go." Jellal cringed. He was about to open the door to the room when Cobra spoke up.

"Tell Sawyer it's not a good idea to juggle jars." The man was reading the minds of his comrades. By accident of course but still.

"Got it. And Sorano?" Jellal needed to know just how many guild members he needed to worry about.

"Richard's got her under control." Cobra was glad to inform his guildmaster that everything was mostly under control. When Angel rampaged, nothing could stop her.

"DID HE JUST SAY RICHARD!?" Jura turned his head so fast, everyone was shocked it didn't fly off.

"Yeah." Jellal nodded shortly.

"OH MY GOD. I'M GOING TO THE OTHER ROOM!" The wizard saint ran off toward the door, almost knocking Jellal over in his frantic rush.

"Jura, what the heck!?" Lyon was thoroughly confused by the man's behavior.

"JELLAL! I NEED HELP BACK HERE!" The same voice from before called from the back room.

"One minute!" The man in question pleaded for some extra time in the front room. The moment he stepped foot in the back, chaos was sure to ensue.

"NO, NOW! WELL, UNLESS YOU'RE TALKING TO ERZA!" The woman called with authority this time.

"Fine." Jellal quickly exited the scene, Erik following behind.

"Uh, so about that discount?" Lyon turned to face Wes once again.

"I got you."

* * *

"Wendy, why are we inside a pickle shop?" Romeo and the girl had entered a few moments before. They had been walking through town together when the girl had yanked him inside the store.

"Pickles are really good, Romeo." Wendy said this as though it should be obvious.

"I guess they are." Romeo nodded in agreement. He felt it best not to question the girl. He didn't want to have to worry about six or so older brother figures chasing him around for hurting Wendy's feelings.

"Now how are we supposed to get pickles off the top shelf?" Wendy was gazing sadly at the last jar on the particular shelf.

"Wait for puberty?" Romeo joked quietly, forgetting Wendy could hear him.

"Haha. I'm serious though!" Wendy smiled at her companion before a look of frustration returned.

"We should've brought Carla." Romeo commented quietly. This time, he knew Wendy would hear him.

"She insisted we go without her." Wendy was confused by the memory. Carla was usually very adamant about Wendy not going anywhere without her. She thought it would be safer for the girl to stay with her.

"Hey, there's a step stool over there." Romeo excitedly pointed to his left. Lo and behold, a random stool had appeared. Grandina was totally not behind it…

"Oh, good." Wendy sighed in relief as she grabbed the jar she wanted. The two companions left soon after.

"Those two are so dating." Igneel commented from his perch.

"Wendy is thirteen!" Gradina shouted at the man. Who in their right mind would assume a thirteen year old was dating?

"And he's fourteen." Skiadrum commented dryly from her own location.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Grandina glared at the other woman. What was she going on about now?

"And his name is Romeo." Metalicana offered this tidbit of information.

"Seriously, what is that supposed to mean?" The sky dragon was exasperated.

"They're definitely going to date in a few years give or take." Weisslogia commented. He really thought this to be true.

"True." Grandina was back to her favorite saying. It had only been a matter of time.

* * *

 **A/N: So? We're not too proud of this one to be honest. We feel like all of the humor is completely disappearing. Sorry, guys. Anyway, let us know what you think! We really appreciate and every view this story receives, so thank you for clicking on our little tale! By the way, Zirconios is the Jade Dragon. Just in case anyone was confused.**


	5. Can You Dig It?

**A/N: Welcome back for the next installment of Dragon Stop Pickle Shop! We're very happy to see you here in chapter five. If anyone can guess the identity of the two people in the first paragraph, you win a lovely prize! Anyone who can correctly guess will be given the chance to name one of our other dragons who will be appearing in future chapters. We need to make sure everyone understands that this story is a crack fic. Things should not be taken seriously at all. We also would like to make sure everyone understands that we acknowledge Skiadrum is most likely male. However, this is our story and having another female dragon was something we wanted. As for Grandina, well we have seen many spellings and pronunciations, but went with that one because it suit the purposes of our story best. Enjoy and tell us what you think!**

 **Disclaimer: We own nothing!**

* * *

The same dragon from chapter two continued his long journey. He was getting closer and closer to his destination every day. But travel was still rough. He had forgotten how annoying it was to go anywhere without his wings. Upon entering a small town a few days travel from his destination, the dragon stumbled upon a cabin. Inside lived an old woman with a crystal ball who seemed ready to make a journey herself. For some unknown reason, they became travel companions. And the journey continued.

* * *

Skiadrum had been trying to get Wes to help clean up the shop for hours. You see, it really was time for some spring cleaning. Empty jars are everywhere and the floor was filthy. Yesterday evening, they had had to restock the shop. Then of ced up everything. And so, she had resorted to the last possible method of getting Weisslogia to help. Bribery.

"If you do what I want, I'll give you this cube." Skiadrum held out the object in question and waited for Wes to observe it. This just had to work.

"It's WHITE!" And it did. Weisslogia was a sucker for anything white.

"Yes it is. Do you like it then?" This was so easy. She just had to keep acting like she hadn't expected him to cave so easily. If Skiadrum let it seem like she was planning this all along, Wes wouldn't help, regardless of the white cube.

"I can dig it." The white dragon answered as he gazed wistfully at the object. Okay, so maybe this wasn't working the way she had wanted it to. He was too distracted by the cube to help with cleaning.

"Okay." The shadow dragon was used to answers like this by now. But honestly, that stare was getting sort of creepy.

"Like I can dig it so hard I'd reach the center of the Earth." And Weisslogia was continuing. Now things had definitely passed creepy.

"Um…" Skiadrum slowly started to back out of the room. Sometimes the boys could just be too weird for her to handle.

"And I'd have to bring Iggy with me." Wes now turned to the window, sighing wistfully. Yup, definitely worse than creepy.

"What the heck?" Skai was sort of frightened at this point. She was almost to the back room.

"Because there's nothing down there. And Iggy would be all like I dig these flames' so we'd come out the other side of the earth." The white dragon turned back to his companion. The wistful look was gone. But the tale still continued.

"I'm just gonna…" Skiadrum grabbed the doorknob, slowly opening up the back room. So much for getting Weisslogia's help with cleaning.

"I dig it man." Weisslogia grabbed the cube and stared Skiadrum dad in the eye. She quickly fled into the back room to get Grandina. The sky dragon as her only hope of keeping the boys from doing something incredibly stupid.

"Dude, I'd totally dig it with you." Igneel came in through the front door, having heard everything. Dragons have amazing hearing so of course he would know exactly what had been going on inside the shop.

The two boys gazed wistfully at the floor now. If they really did decide to dig a hole, they were in for a lecture. Grandina was already pissed about the hole in the ceiling. Who knows how she would react to a hole in the floor.

* * *

"So uh, do you guys mind if I try out a new type of magic?" Jellal Fernandes was standing in the front room. And he looked nervous. He obviously wasn't used to asking people before trying out new things.

"Another dead one? Where are you even finding these?" Skiadrum was extremely curious. Jellal was known for pulling random magics, long thought dead, out of nowhere. That boy knew way too much.

"I keep remembering them. So can I test it out?" The boy wasn't exactly sure how he knew all of them wither. Some days he would sit down and 'hey, look you know another type of magic'. It was a strange life that boy led.

"Yeah. Just do it in the closet. I mean, I would say the back room but…" Grandina answered this question. She was the one in charge of placement of things. If any part of the store was allowed to be ruined, it was the tiny little closet in the corner.

"Everyone is always back there. I know." Jellal smiled. Yeah, that back room was almost never empty. Crime Sorciere was basically living back there. Oh, and when they were off taking out dark guilds, random dragons kept showing up.

"Good. Now, what is it supposed to do anyway?" Metalicana was curious as well. You never quite knew what a dead or lost magic would do. Strange things happened. I mean, dragon slayers used a dead magic. Of course the dragons would be interested.

"I'm not too sure what'll happen yet." The man at least had the decency to look embarrassed. Honestly, trying out random magic without any idea of what could happen was ridiculous.

"Interesting." Weisslogia was getting excited. The prospect of a surprise was an entertaining one.

* * *

"It opened up a portal." Jellal walked out of the closet nearly an hour after he had gone in. The air of suspense surrounding the dragons had been broken as he spoke.

"Cool! To where?" Igneel was probably the most excited out of the bunch. A portal was a pretty cool thing you see.

"Edolas." The bluenette answered his question as he turned to open the closet door once again. Out walked an identical man.

"Wait a second. There are two of you." Igneel slowly tried to process this information. It wasn't making any sense. Well, maybe Jellal just had a random twin.

"I'm Mystogan." The man introduced himself. And honestly, that should have been enough explanation. Sadly, Igneel had forgotten the earlier discussions about the masked member of Fairy Tail.

"Edolas me." Jellal explained further, ridding Igneel of his confused look. Thank goodness for Jellals and their patience.

"That is so cool! I wonder if there's an Edolas me." Igneel looked on in awe. It seemed he had already forgotten about Grandina and Porlyusica. Poor thing really did not pay attention. Either that or he just had a very short string of memories.

"There is. I've met mine." Grandina loved to tell the story of the day she had met the crabby old woman. If Igneel really had forgotten, she wasn't going to be complaining about retelling it anytime soon.

"Grandina!" Skiadrum attempted to keep the woman from telling her story. Honestly, she should know better. There was a few things about dragons involved in the tale.

"Don't you mean Dina!" Metalicana tried to cover up the mistake. Yup, the mighty Skiadrum had finally let a name slip. Thank goodness it was in front of two Jellals.

"Calm down. On day one my guild came in here to tell you guys we know who you are." Jellal gestured to the back room as he said this. The rest of his guild was inside. If you listened closely enough, you could hear Meredy's continual sighs.

"Wait a second, it's the guy that made Wendy smart!" Igneel was back at it. That man ignored fifty percent of conversation and said whatever he wanted, whenever that was.

"Igneel! I am her mother!" Grandina was using the same argument she always brought up when Wendy was concerned.

"Yeah, but maybe he's the reason she's intelligent." Igneel wasn't letting this go. But neither was Grandina.

"Still my daughter."The sky dragon made it seem as though the conversation could not be continued under any circumstances. Igneel understood what her tone meant.

"Wait, is this a pickle shop!?" Mystogan looked around in awe. The shelves of pickle jars were plentiful. Anyone would be shocked had they not known what the store's primary product was.

"Uh, yeah." Skiadrum looked taken aback. She hadn't expected him to ask for clarification. The pickle-ish origins of the shop were obvious.

"Awesome! I was getting tired of Gildarts and his stupid potatoes." The king looked around once more, happily inhaling the scent of pickles. Ah yes, they would be a welcome break from potatoes.

"What are you talking about?" Metalicana was confused. He thought earthland Gildarts was the one with the thing for potatoes.

"Oh, in Edolas he's a potato farmer. But it's all we've eaten recently." Well that explained a lot. Maybe Gildarts had met his Edolas self before. Or maybe his love for potatoes exceeded all reason and he loved them in every universe.

"And why is that?" Metalicana was a little perturbed. Gildarts, well the Earthland one at least, was his friend. Yes, friend. He felt a little uncomfortable hearing anything bad about the man. Even if it was his Edolas self.

"No one wants to be mean and tell him no." Mystogan spoke the truth. Gildarts in Edolas was just so sweet. He asked quietly if anyone wanted some potatoes and they just couldn't tell him no. It was actually quite funny when Knightwalker was asked about said potatoes.

"Okay then. Well, help yourself to some pickles." Skiadrum cut in, hoping for the conversation to stop. The store was getting messy again. And use, Zirconios had been in there an hour ago to make everything as messy as it was.

"I'll work on getting the portal to go away." Jellal turned to the closet, hoping to get out of helping clean. Yes, Skiadrum did make Crime Sorciere clean up the shop. They were sort of living there halfway so it only made sense.

"Nah, just leave it. More business for us." Weisslogia went to stop Jellal. And he was right. Edolas folk loved pickles just as much as Earthland people. There sure would be a business increase.

"Okay then. So I guess Edolas citizens are welcome here whenever." Skiadrum saw the good side to what Weisslogia said. They would be getting more business, there was no doubt about it.

"Mystogan is technically a member of Fairy Tail. So no bills for you." Metalicana said this in a matter of fact tone. Mystogan looked confused but decided to go along with what everyone was saying. They did own the shop after all.

"The rest of your people have to pay." Grandina looked at the man. He nodded slowly. Honestly, this whole thing was confusing if you didn't know about Gildarts and his decision to pay for the guild.

"You do realize that there's a Fairy Tail guild in Edolas too, right?" Weisslogia said this just to see how everyone would react. He wasn't expecting anyone to take that little fact into account even after finding out about it.

"Oh. Well I guess those guys don't have to pay either." Skiadrum nodded as she went back to the shelf. Well, she did turn to force Jellal and Mystogan to clean up the floor. Zirconios really needed to stop making such a mess.

* * *

Outside the shop was a group of six or so. They made their way toward the door in an excited manner. You see, these people had not yet had the chance to visit the wondrous pickle shop. They had heard such amazing things and just had to check it out themselves.

"So this is the place everyone's been talking about." A man questioned his friends. Why was this tiny building really getting all of that hype?

"Yup. So do you think Sherry was telling the truth about the discount for people with white hair?" It was a woman who spoke up this time. She would never dye her hair white, but it didn't hurt to know.

"I don't see how anyone could make up something that ridiculous." One of the other men answered her question. And it was true. How could anyone actually make up something that stupid?

"Yeah. Do you guys think the pickles really are as good as they say?" One of the remaining few who had not spoken, voiced their inner thoughts this time.

"Not sure." The first man answered this question. He wasn't exactly sure how anything could be that good. Especially pickles. What was so great about them?

"Welcome! I'm Wes White. Find me if you need anything." Weisslogia was the only one in the front at this point. So of course he had to play the part of a kind shopkeeper. Which, he was, but still.

"Wait, do you guys give out free samples?" If you haven't already guessed, members of the Blue Pegasus guild were the current customers. Hibiki had been selected as spokesperson.

"That's the only thing you'll get for free!" Although it sounded rude, Wes was not aware of that when he made the comment.

"Okay?" Hibiki looked concerned. Everyone else had split up and headed off to different shelves. Only he and Jenny remained where they were.

"But here you go. How many of you are there?" The white dragon hadn't thought to count before heading off to grab the samples. So yeah he probably grabbed too many.

"Six? I think it's six." Jenny answered him as she looked around the shop, counting her companions.

"Here you all go then!" Weisslogia handed over the tray, walking off and handing every one of the customers their own sample.

The six all ate the food, scared of what the taste may be. They were pleasantly surprised to find that the pickles were the most amazing thing they had ever had the honor of eating before in their lives.

"Woah. So are the rumors true about these being great enough to resurrect someone!?" Hibiki had heard the rumors. And now he wanted to know how much truth was in them.

"It depends on the person, but probably. We do sell some rare resurrection pickles." Wes mentioned the forbidden merchandise. Yes, they did have resurrection pickles. But those weren't for sale.

"So do you think those would be strong enough to bring my dead girlfriend back to life?" Hibiki continued down the same train of thought as earlier. He was obviously only focused on one thing and was unaware of the things being said around him.

"Excuse me! You are dating me!" An angry Jenny Realight chimed in from her spot next to Hibiki.

"Shut up, Jenny. This is something really important." The man hushed the girl before turning back to Wes. See, he paid no mind to anything other than his goal.

"Well yeah, they probably would be. But I can't sell them to you. I don't want to have to deal with some angry matchmakers and such." Weisslogia supplied this response solemnly. He didn't like raining on people's parades, but it had to happen.

"Understood. Jenny, why do you look mad?" Hibiki snapped out of it and finally realized that Jenny was basically on fire. Yes, she was that angry.

"Are you being serious right now!?" The outraged cry rang out as the woman marched out of the building. She would just wait outside,

"Why wouldn't I be?" He called out after her, but did not follow.

On the other side of the store, trouble was brewing.

"Ren! Stop being rude." The blonde boy glared at his companion. They could not be called friends in this moment.

"How am I being rude?" The man in question looked thoroughly confused.

"You're completely insensitive about my height." Eve had always been extremely insecure about his size. Being short wasn't fun at all.

"How so?" Ren looked even more confused than before. If that was possible, that is.

"You are literally moving all of the jars I want up to the highest shelf." The younger male continued to glare. He was frustrated.

"Sorry. I didn't realize." Ren looked extremely embarrassed. Either he really had been unaware or he was flustered that his rude behavior had been exposed.

"You know, sometimes I regret ever breaking that vase." Eve sighed quietly. He hadn't meant for anyone to hear what he said.

"Eve, what are you talking about?" The taller man was befuddled once again. What was up with Eve and being confusing today?

"Oh nothing! I'm certainly not discussing the means by which Master Bob got me to join Blue Pegasus. I would never talk about such a thing." The blonde laughed nervously as he looked out the window.

"Didn't you just join like the rest of us?" Ren was still attempting to get answers. Today was just a weird day for him.

"Let's go with that. Yeah."

And in another corner of the shop…

"MEN!" A yell rang out.

"PARFUM!" A second voice joined in.

"MEN!"

"PARFUM!"

And back to our first group:

"So uh, not to be rude or anything. But why did you bring a blue rabbit with you?" Wes was starting conversation again. Only this time he actually wanted to know the answer.

"Oh, you'll have to ask Ichiya about that one." The man seemed to drift off into his thoughts.

 _"Nichiya, wear this! It will be less suspicious!"_

 _"PARFUM!"_

 _"Yes, it does have a wonderful PARFUM!"_

Hibiki snapped out of his daze. "I have a feeling you won't understand either way."

"I guess I wouldn't."

* * *

"Is anyone else jealous that their kid hasn't come in with a significant other yet?" Weisslogia was gazing sadly at a random picture of Sting he had produced.

"We're literally the only two whose kids haven't come in." Skiadrum pu in her two cents. But yes, she was actually jealous too.

"I still don't think it counts for Wendy. She's thirteen." Grandina refused to admit that her child would ever start dating. The idea was completely foreign to her.

"Like we said before, that boy is fourteen." Igneel wouldn't let the whole Wendy occurrence go either. The dragon would go to his grave insisting the kids would date.

"It's completely plausible that they will date in the future." Metalicana was involved. And he was using fancy words!

"Stop talking about it!" Grandina really was done hearing about her daughter and boys. Maybe Wendy would just be a career woman. There was nothing wrong with staying single.

"Fine. Now, as I was saying, I'm sort of upset that my son hasn't been back." Skiadrum turned the conversation back to her child. Although she was stealthy about it, the woman loved to talk about Rogue.

"I understand the feeling." Wes confirmed his sadness once again.

"Yeah, if they do come back with someone, just make sure you don't freak out like Igneel." Metalicana would never just pass up a chance to be rude to the fire dragon.

"I did not freak out!" Igneel released a small stream of fire. This happened every time he yelled about something.

"You did. You almost said your actual name. You hadn't almost slipped up like that since day one." Grandina was joining in on the fun. She, like Metalicana, would not pass up a chance to make fun of one of her fellow dragons.

" _Day one. Day one._ " Igneel started to hum. What song was it you ask? I do not know.

"Stop singing!" Skiadrum was angry. How dare they interrupt her talk about Rogue just to fight with each other!

"Sorry." All three dragons looked bashful.

"You should be. Now, I just heard footsteps so we should probably get out of here." Skiadrum went back to her normal self. She had to seem nice in order to sell products.

"Why are we always in the back room?" Igneel asked this question. It was strange for him to actually wonder about something such as this.

"Because we are! Crime Sorciere basically lives in here now." Metalicana responded quickly. And he was right. The guild's base was mostly in the back room of the shop.

"True. Now where are those guys anyway?" Ah yes, Grandina slipped in her favorite word once again. It was hard to tell if she did it intentionally or not.

"Taking out a dark guild a couple of towns over." Weisslogia was usually the most up to date about the guild's whereabouts. It was probably because he spent the most time in the back out of all of the dragons.

"Oh, okay." The sky dragon nodded, accepting his answer.

"But like I said, someone needs to go in the front room." Skiadrum was once again trying to get everyone moving. Oh how bad would it look if none of the workers were in the front when a customer arrived.

"We're working on it."

* * *

"Yukino, hurry up!" An excited yell rang throughout the streets. A young man was trying to urge his companion to move forward at a faster pace.

"I literally have no idea where we're going." Too bad she was leading and had no idea where he wanted her to go.

"Oh sorry. But hurry up!" The young man stepped in front of her and began dragging her along. The couple soon reached a small building in the middle of town. "Here we are!" The boy opened the door and guided his friend inside.

"A pickle shop?" Yukino was shocked. The sheer number of jars in the building was beyond comprehension. But one question remained on her mind. Why would anyone open a shop to see pickles?

"Pickles are awesome!" It was as if Sting had read her mind. Of course his answer wasn't exactly what she had been looking for.

The young man smiled and grabbed a few jars before pulling his companion out the door. Before they left, you could hear her ask about payment. His response was never heard.

"Does that count as white?" Weisslogia was the one to break the silence. From what he understood, his predictions had been right, unlike Metalicana's.

"I'm not sure. There was a bit of a blue tint." Grandina was very understanding of his confusion. The girl's hair was oddly colored. She had only ever seen one other person with that exact shade of it.

"I think it's white." Wes firmly stated. He wasn't going to admit the blue tint was there.

"I think blue!" Cue Skiadrum joining in on the argument.

"It's white!" The white dragon voiced his opinion once again. Only this time his tone was even more firm.

"You think everything is white!" Skiadrum shouted from her corner. The whole color obsession was starting to get on her nerves.

"Did you just say WHITE!?" Weisslogia looked like a kid in a candy store. Apparently he thought he had just won the argument on the girl's hair color.

"Oh dear." Skiadrum could only sigh at the man's antics.

* * *

The bell chimed as the shop door was opened. A strange thunk was heard as the new customers entered.

"Ouch. Could you please let go now?" Rogue Cheney was being dragged by his hair. Yes, his hair. That ponytail wasn't a good idea, it seemed.

"No. You take an extremely long amount of time in this shop." The woman accompanying him sighed loudly. Last time she had waited outside the shop for him. It had taken hours for him to leave. She was not going through that ever again.

"But I can't even look at anything!" The sad cry left the man's mouth. He was practically being dragged across the floor. Poor thing.

"Fine. But I demand to be primary caregiver of your cat for a week." She was going to let him go either way. But why not try to get a few days with Frosch out of it first?

"No way. We're leaving." The man swiftly stood, almost knocking her over. He had been humoring her, it seemed. The man was completely capable of escaping her hold as he just displayed.

"I thought you loved pickles." Kagura looked upset. No one was too sure if she was sad about not getting Frosch, or because her companion had easily overpowered her.

"I love Frosch more!" This was true. That man's love for his cat could never be outdone. Frosch was his whole world.

"And what about-" The sentence was cut off as they left the building. The dragons could have heard but they were currently distracted with teasing Skiadrum.

"Sweetest?" Grandina was the first to start on it. The others were all going to follow soon enough.

"There was literally no reason to assume those two are dating!" Skiadrum had to defend herself. Sure, she had participated in teasing everyone else. But honestly, they could cut her some slack. She spoke the truth too. Nothing indicated any dating whatsoever.

"But did you see them?" Igneel joined in now. He had the biggest grin on his face.

"Yes. They were arguing the whole time!" Skiadrum figured it was best to just stick to the absolute facts. She couldn't pull mother's intuition into this. They would all just continue to fight her on the issue of her son's relationship status.

"It obviously means they're in love!" Igneel cut in once again. The others all nodded furiously in agreement.

"No it doesn't!" The shadow dragon could see that the room was getting darker. Her friends were obviously pushing her pretty far.

"Yes, it really does." Weisslogia nodded as he said this. The others did the same.

"True." Grandina just had to chime in with her lovely little saying. There would never be a day when she did not say the word.

"Why are you all ganging up on me!?" Sure, she had helped gang up on everyone else. But seriously, Skiadrum was the one running the show here. They should really just be nicer to her, you know.

"Just acknowledge the fact that your son has a violent girlfriend and we'll all move on with our lives." Metalicana said this. He had had the hardest time accepting where his son's affections lay. But now it seemed as though Skiadrum was having it worse.

"Fine." Nope, nevermind. Metalicana had taken weeks to accept the facts. Skiadrum took a few minutes.

* * *

"You know, this week has been rather uneventful compared to some of the other ones." Igneel was depressed. He liked it when strange things happened. This week just wasn't very much fun for him.

"We have a portal to Edolas in our closet." Skiadrum deadpanned. How could Igneel not comprehend the oddity of that occurrence?

"So? I mean, that's sort of boring. Don't you think?" The fire dragon continued to rant about the utter uneventfulness of the past week. Apparently a portal wasn't actually as cool as he had originally thought.

"No! No one in their right mind would think that's normal, or boring!" Skiadrum may have accidentally released shadows at that point. But why, oh why, was Igneel so nonchalant about the whole thing!? Shouldn't he be a little freaked out? Or even interested?

"I think it is though!" Igneel was thoroughly offended. How dare Skiadrum ignore his opinion!

"Like I said, no one in their right mind!" The shadow dragon smirked. So did Metalicana. It would be fun to see how this one played out.

"Rude!" Igneel released some fire. It was an accident though. Even he knew better than to get into a fight with Skiadrum. Words were fine. Fists were not.

"But it's true!" The shadow dragon let this slip before realizing exactly what words she had used. She turned very slowly to face the other female.

"Girl, you did not!" The sky dragon roared as she jumped on top of the other, successfully starting another fight. Why did this always happen?

"Grandina, no!" Metalicana tried to break up the fight as Weisslogia and Igneel proceeded to have a conversation, ignoring the fight going on.

* * *

 **A/N: So? I was worried about this one. We both were. But eh, it exists! And I hope you guys find some enjoyment from it. We were a little stuck for a while there. Our inspiration was dwindling down. Please let us know if you enjoyed any part of this terrible chapter! Thank you for reading!**


	6. What About The Princess?

**A/N: Welcome back boys and girls! Thank you for reading all of those previous five chapters. It means a lot to us. Anyway, we must first go over the same explanation used in every chapter so far. We acknowledge that Skiadrum is most likely a male. For the purposes of this story, Skiadrum has been made female. If you don't like it, please reconsider. As for the spelling of Grandina, well we chose it for a reason. If you guys think this story is getting too weird, please do tell! Anyway, prepare yourself for some OC dragons and maybe a few more resurrections. We're not exactly sure how much we want to do with that. Oh, and the huge reveal of the identity of the dragon from chapter one will be here! And sorry for the wait, guys. School is stressful and we were both super busy!**

 **Disclaimer: We own nothing!**

* * *

The lovely new travel companions from last chapter were nearing their journey's end. The dragon and the old woman were both relieved to see Magnolia was only a few hours travel. You see, this journey had taken them much longer than necessary. They had taken quite a few wrong turns along the way. While the woman wasn't terrible with direction, the dragon was. So yeah, he had led them astray a few times. It was a strange thing indeed considering his sense of smell. The only explanation offered to the old woman was that he had been distracted by the stench of pickles. The woman had been baffled by the explanation but let it slide just this once. Because as I did say before, they were a strange pair indeed.

* * *

In the shop, a debate was brewing. That Edolas portal was pretty amazing. But should it really remain in their closet?

"Should we keep the portal?" Skiadrum looked to be deep in thought. Was a direct entrance to Edolas really something they should keep in their shop?

"Yeah, I don't see why we wouldn't." Grandina said this as she exited the backroom. In her mind, the portal was doing no harm. Why get rid of something harmless?

"And it could get us more profits. I mean, if Edolas citizens come through and shop here we're making more money." Weisslogia backed up Grandina's claim. I mean, the portal could potential help their business.

"I know, but isn't it a bit odd?" The shadow dragon just wasn't sure. That portal would forever haunt her thoughts.

"We're keeping it." Igneel walked into the room nodding his head as if agreeing with himself. Metalicana nodded slowly as well. He sort of liked having the portal around. It truly had the potential of making their lives more interesting.

"Fine. But if it backfires I'm blaming all of you." Little did Skiadrum know that that portal wouldn't. It would provide more and more business, bringing her so much joy.

* * *

The door opened and in walked a group of men. One of them looked around excitedly. "We finally made it!"

"This was only a short walk from the hotel, why are you so excited?" One of the others could not fathom what the reason for excitement would be. The store sold pickles, not anything that really warranted joy.

"No reason." The earlier man responded, finally calming down a decent amount. What was wrong with him today?

"Anyway, Bacchus, this is the place, right?" The second man turned to another companion. This man appeared to be bored by the shop.

"It must be." The man nodded to himself, as if affirming his thoughts. There was no other pickle shop in Magnolia. This had to be it!

"I wonder how Cana even started on this stuff." One of the others looked to be in deep thought. You see, they had only come here after hearing that one Cana Alberona was now binging on pickle juice rather than alcohol. Sharing the same feelings for alcohol as the girl, Bacchus had wanted to see what was so great about this juice of pickles.

"Who knows? But you'll once again have the better tolerance!" The other men all cheered in agreement. Their Bacchus could never be beaten!

"I don't think it's even possible to get drunk or pass out from pickle juice intake." One of the men stopped his celebrating. Was it even possible to judge tolerance for pickle juice?

"It isn't." Igneel randomly appeared to talk to the group. The dragons rarely ever had customers who got in and out without speaking to them.

"And how would you know, stranger?" Okay, if you haven't guessed, the group that had entered the shop was from Quatro Puppy. And as for their names, well I don't care enough to learn the,m

"I work here. If you pass out, then I have no idea what's wrong with you." Igneel answered the question with a smile as he held out a jar of juice.

"Hand it over."

"How about you pay me first?" The fire dragon said this in a strained manner. These customers were rather rude.

"Oh sorry!" The men all scrambled to pay the dragon. As they did so, Bacchus took a sip from the jar. He promptly collapsed on the group in a heap.

"I thought you said that wasn't possible!" One of the angry guild members shouted at the worker.

"It shouldn't be!" Igneel was in shock. This honestly should not be possible no matter the circumstances.

* * *

"So wait, you're the king in Edolas?" Grandina was talking with Mystogan. Their conversation had begun with a talk about Wendy. Now it was on personal matters.

"Woah."

"I know. Just don't tell Lahar. He'll mo- Wait on second thought, tell Lahar. Tell him now!" Jellal piped up from his spot to the side of the room. He paused after suggesting they don't tell Lahar. Realization that this was an amazing opportunity struck.

"I'll text him!" Igneel pulled out what looked to be a phone.

"Since when do we have cell phones?" Cue Grandina questioning the phenomenon. It was strange indeed and did warrant this suspicion.

"They aren't cell phones. They're miniature communication lacrimas!" Skiadrum was there to set everything straight. She tried her hardest to keep up to date with the new technology.

"What's the difference?" Metalicana couldn't see anything that set the two apart. Cell phones, miniature communication lacrimas, they were all the same to him.

"I can see more and more of that wall crumbling apart." Weisslogia sighed sadly upon coming to this conclusion. That wall was falling apart and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

"Huh?" Igneel looked quite confused. He had zoned out and was unaware of what had led up to Weisslogia's comment.

"Nothing. Just text him."

* * *

Lahar looked down at his phone. Yes, a phone. He wasn't sure how he had ended up with it but went along with the situation anyway. "JELLAL IS THE KING IN EDOLAS! GOODBYE DORANBABE, I'M MOVING!"

"Lahar, wait." The other man tried to stop his companion from doing anything rash.

"NOPE! I'M OUT OF HERE!" The other continued pulling random bags out of thin air. He soon had a whole armada of suitcases.

"Where did you get that suitcase?" Doranbolt was completely baffled at this point. Nothing made sense anymore.

"DORANBOLT LET ME HAVE MY MOMENT OF JOY!" And with that said, the man made his way to the shop, waved a quick goodbye to Jellal, and traveled to Edolas. He would be happy there.

* * *

"Is that Erza coming in here?" Wes was straining himself to see out the window.

"I don't think so- Wait, I'd recognize that scarlet hair anywhere. Scatter!" Jellal approached, thinking that Erza would never journey to the shop. It didn't sell armor or cake, so what was the point? He had been shocked to see that oh so familiar hair.

Upon hearing his counter part's exclamation. Mystogan had lunged for the doorknob to the closet. He was out of the building and hopping into that portal in a matter of seconds. Earthland Jellal had jumped into the back room, locking the door behind him.

"And they still don't believe us when we tell them they get awkward around Erza!" Wes let the comment slip. The others could only nod their heads. Those poor oblivious versions of Jellal...

"Eh, let them live in their little river of denial." Metalicana was feeling rather generous today, it seemed.

"Fine. But they'll have to come to terms with their behavior eventually." Grandina conceded. The boys would have to face reality eventually. She could spare them for the time being.

The bell chimed as the door was opened. The Fairy Tail mages entered. Erza gazed at the shelves mesmerized. "So it really is just pickles then?"

"Actually ma'am, we have a special stash under the front desk where we keep potato seeds." Wes, ever the salesman, approached the duo. He knew mentioning the stash gave them the best chance for business. "Oh, and we recently added strawberry cake to the stash. Someone claimed that it would offer more business prospects."

"Strawberry cake!" The woman's eyes lit up. Cake was a beautiful thing. Strawberry cake was even greater.

"Erza, calm down." Gray was scared. There was no way someone could be that happy.

"No, Gray! Thank you for taking me to this marvelous store!"

* * *

Back in the Fairy Tail guild hall, Gray and Erza had finally returned. The latter was dragging a wagon full of cakes behind her. Of course their outing together did not sit well with everyone…

"Gray-sama took Erza with him and not Juvia!" The water mage burst into tears. She was always rather sensitive about Gray and his 'outings'. Why couldn't he just take her everywhere?

"Calm down, it's not like that." The ice mage quickly tried to stop her crying. He did not want to deal with Makarov if the tears continued to fall.

"Did Juvia do something to displease her love?" The floor of the hall had begun to flood. A puddle of tears had turned into a pond.

"GRAY! YOU FIX THIS NOW!" Makarov shouted from his place on the second floor. Sure, he was usually nice, but this flooding issue they had...

"I'M TRYING!" Gray was in distress. He didn't want an angry guild master after him but Juvia sure wasn't stopping anytime soon. His reassurances had fallen on deaf ears. There was no way to convince the girl the situation hadn't been what she thought.

"WELL TRY HARDER! DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY FINES WE HAD TO PAY LAST TIME THIS HAPPENED AND SHE FLOODED THE TOWN!?" Makarov continued yelling as water continued rising.

"YOU WON'T LET ME FORGET!" This was true. Last time Juvia had cried, Makarov had gripped about it for weeks to the ice mage. The master had decided everything went back to Gray. And so, the damage to Gray's sanity was done.

"Juvia, don't worry. He was obviously checking to make sure it was safe for you to enter. That's why he brought Erza with him, he doesn't have to worry about her!" Romeo Conbolt, bless his soul, had come to the rescue. The decrease in flow of tears could be seen by all.

"Is this true, Gray-sama?" Juvia looked so hopeful, like a puppy almost. Poor girl was almost obsessed...

"Uh, yeah, we'll go with that." Gray let out a breath of air as the tears stopped and the girl smiled brightly. All was well.

"GRAY YOU BETTER BE THANKING ROMEO FOR THAT!" Makarov put in his two cents. He would be back to his loving guild master self as soon as the hall was drained of water. Floods turned him into quite a violent person.

"I WILL, CALM DOWN!" Gray reassured the man that he knew what was proper etiquette. As soon as the sentence left his mouth, the guild doors swung open and in came Lyon Vastia.

"GRAY, WHY ARE YOU YELLING!? DID SOMEONE THREATEN YOU!?" Lyon shouted. Yeah, it was not necessary. But the ice mage seemed to think it was what had to be done. Afterall, Gray had been shouting moments ago.

"Lyon, what are you doing here?" Gray was shocked to find his, well what were they?, in the guild hall. There was literally no reason for the man to be there.

"I uh, I was in town on a job." The ice mage seemed to struggle at finding a response. While everyone else knew what this meant, Gray did not notice the moment Lyon hesitated.

"No, why are you at our guild?" Gray took in Lyon's response before realizing it was not the explanation he wanted. Why was the other man in the guild hall?

"I obviously came to tell you that I was not in town for the explicit purpose of visiting you to make sure you were okay." Lyon let this out in a rush. He looked nervous, hoping desperately that Gray would accept this answer.

"Because that makes perfect sense." The younger of the two seemed to think this was the best explanation possible for the situation. The others looked unsure. Even Natsu seemed to think the excuse was utter bologna.

"It does. Guys, he would never come to town just to see me and make sure I was okay."

"And I would never buy a house in Magnolia because the hotel prices were racking up due to the fact that I came to visit Gray every weekend I didn't have a job." The silver haired man hurriedly let out this explanation. Did Lyon not realize how obvious he was making himself?

"See, it makes perfect sense!" Natsu chimed in with Gray nodding furiously in agreement. Lyon nodded as well. Although he clearly wasn't as into it as the others.

"You deserve those medals. All three of you." The scarlet haired beauty of Fairy Tail could only stare at the boys sadly. Those medals were not for a good thing...

"What medals?" Natsu turned to look at Erza. And what had be been doing before looking at her? Why admiring his gold medal of course!

* * *

The bell to the shop rung as a customer entered. This was not a new customer. Oh no, it was one who graced the shop owners with his presence almost every single day. Gildarts had returned from a week long job and was in desperate need of replenishing his potato seed stash.

"Ah, Gildarts. We have you usual right here. So how was that job?" Metalicana smiled at his friend, happy to see he wasn't injured or anything. Afterall, some jobs were extremely dangerous.

"It was easy, just like usual. Although I was able to find out what had Cana acting so weird. Why didn't you just tell me she was addicted to pickle juice?" The crash mage looked betrayed. How could his new found friend not tell him this!?

"I wasn't aware that you didn't know. I assumed what you were referring to was some boy." The iron dragon was protective. He hadn't known he was hiding anything from the angry man before him.

"Ah. Wait, maybe the pickle juice isn't it! I need to go!" Gildarts calmed down. He then turned determined as he ran out the shop door. His potato seeds were clutched tightly in his hands as he fled the scene. There was no way on earth that Gildarts would ever forget his seeds. They were his life. He loved them more than Cana.

"Igneel. why the hell were you on the ceiling!?" As soon as the other man had exited, the fire dragon had fallen off the ceiling. It appeared as though he had been up there the whole time Gildarts was in the store. Seriously, what was wrong with Igneel. Metalicana wanted to know.

"I may or may not have been jealous. But you know what, I don't need to be jelly anymore! Cause there's a jelly right there and another one over there!" Igneel blushed slightly upon being questioned. He hadn't planned on falling, that was for sure. But alas, it had happened and now he had to deal with the judgemental stares as consequence.

"Okay. But which one of you is which? You're wearing the same pants so I can't tell." Metalicana looked at both Jellas. They were on opposite sides of the room and Igneel had pointed them out moments ago.

"Well excuse me if I wanted to try on Mystogan's clothes again!" This one was clearly Jellal. Why else would he make the claim he just had?

"Oh. That one has a bandana, the other one doesn't." Igneel pointed to the man who had not spoken. He was adorning the famous green bandana. This would make telling Jellal and Mystogan apart so much easier.

"Is it really that hard to tell us apart?" Both men seemed offended at the confusion. They truly believed that there was no way anyone could confuse them. They acted way too different, didn't they?

"Yup." Metalicana and Igneel nodded in unison. There was no denying it. Those Jellals acted like the same person. No matter how hard they denied it, it was fact.

* * *

Back in the Fairy Tail guild hall, Gildarts returned, clearly flustered. He had been searching for Cana for quite some time, but to no avail. That girl didn't seem to be anywhere in Magnolia. The crash mage had even managed to discover the supposedly nonexistent Weekend House belonging to Lyon. Yeah, Cana was nowhere to be found. Maybe she truly was with a boy!

"Hey Gildarts! I wasn't expecting to see you in the guild hall today." Macao called out goodnaturedly from his table. Wakaba waved as well. It wasn't everyday one was able to find Gildarts in the guild hall. He was usually out on missions.

"I just got back from a job. I need to find Cana." The man sat down, knowing that Wakaba and Macao were prepared to have a conversation with him. And who was he to deny the two such an honor?

"Sorry dude, she's off on a job with Loke. He took a vacation just so they could go relive the days of their friendship." Wakaba revealed. There was no reason to deny the desperate father this information.

"What are you talking about?" The crash mage looked concerned. What days of friendship was he talking about? As far as Gildarts knew, the boy was a celestial spirit. How ever could they have been friends?

"Cana and Loke used to be a team before he became a celestial spirit again, duh." Wakaba explained the situation. Everyone in the guild knew about this except Gildarts, it seemed.

"So why are you looking for her anyway?" Macao was quick to change the topic. No need to allow Gildarts time to question them about that friendship.

"She's my daughter." Gildarts stared at the man, clearly confused. Why did he need a reason to look for his baby girl?

"Well you're sort of a suckish dad so…" Wakaba trailed off realizing the danger he put himself in. Gildarts probably wouldn't take well to the comment.

"Hush, Wakaba. You're one to talk. Anyway, you haven't exactly been the best father, you know." Macao tried to say this kindly. He didn't want to offend Gildarts in any way. But come on, who would just up and run two days after finding out they were a dad? He hadn't even done anything for his kid beforehand.

"I mean, after the island you could have at least made a National Cana Day before running off on some mission again." Wakaba chimed in with this little comment. It was sort of a jab at Macao. You see, Mr. Conbolt had actually gone on to petition the king for a Nation Romeo Day after his son had been born.

"That;s a marvelous idea!" Gildarts' eyes began to sparkle. Clearly he thought this plan was incapable of failure.

"Woah, and how exactly do you plan on doing that?" Macao was taken aback. Gildarts looked as though he knew exactly how to make this holiday a reality. It was sort of terrifying.

"Fairy Tail has nowhere near enough power to do that." Wakaba once again attempted to rain of Gildarts' parade. What was up with this sudden urge to destroy the crash mage's good spirits?

"But we could. All we have to do is dispose of the king and put Makarov on the throne. They're both short old men. No one will know the difference." Now this sounded like a bit of a joke. But judging by the serious facial expression Gildarts was displaying, he was actually considering taking this course of action.

"But what about the princess? Hisui won't be easy to replace." Macao attempted to dissuade the man. Why on earth did Gildarts seem to think this was a good idea anyway?

"We just put Freed in a dress, duh." Wakaba supplied this solution. He was just egging Gildarts on now. Was there any way to stop the crash mage now?

"And what about Arcadios? He's sure to know." Gildarts actually looked sad. By asking this question it was clear that he was now questioning his plans. Good.

"Pft. He'll just be happy the princess isn't rejecting his flirting like she does. I mean, Freed wouldn't mind a little flirting coming from the guy." Wakaba scoffed at Gildarts' worries. This plan would work. It was perfect, there was no way it could go wrong.

"What exactly are you implying about me!?" Freed had heard the tail end of this conversation. And he was angry. It sounded like they were painting him out to be someone different than he was. Freed would not stand for this.

"Nothing. Now go back to creeping on Laxus." The man tried to divert Freed's attention. They would never be able to finish discussing possible treason if the darn Christmas tree kept listening in.

"Hey, you do you and I'll do me!" Freed was outraged. How dare they call him a creeper! His version of um.. stalking was too sophisticated for such a term!

"And you want to do Laxus." Another guild member let this slip out. It was clear they hadn't meant for anyone to hear. Too bad Freed's glare was on them faster than they could formulate another coherent thought. "Okay, okay. Whatever you say." The guild member went back to whatever they had been doing beforehand. Freed continued to glare menacingly.

"Maybe we should put Bisca in the dress. She has green hair too. And less of an attitude." Macao observed Freed's behavior and came to the conclusion that they would never be able to get Freed to cooperate. Bisca was more of a team player. Maybe she was a better option. And now Macao was getting way too involved in this ridiculous plan…

"Yeah, but Alzack would be a terrible Arcadios. Sure, they have similar coloring but it would never work." Gildarts said this. And it was true. Alzack would never be able to pull off a convincing Arcadios act.

"What do you mean?" Wakaba didn't understand why Al wouldn't be able to play the role. Macao, however, did.

"Al looks more like a supermodel than a pervy middle aged man." The blue haired man explained to his friend. Gildarts nodded along.

"True." Wakaba had to admit that they were right about that. Alzack would never be able to act like the guard. It was now so clear. But with this declaration came an intense glare from a different building in Magnolia. Yes, Grandina had heard this utterance and decided that Wakaba must be destroyed if he ever said the sacred word again.

* * *

Now in the pickle shop, the door opened and in walked two figures. They weren't just two random customers either. Oh no, these were our strange little companions from the start of the chapter. They had finally reached their destination.

"Welcome! We're pleased to see we have new custom-" Metalicana's jaw dropped. There, was one of his greatest enemies.

"Acnologia!" Igneel shouted this fiercely. Fire left his mouth with the utterance. Sure, the identification of their customer was unneeded, but it was still appreciated.

"Shoot! What is wrong with me!? Why do I have these powers? I can remove clothing! How is that supposed to help me now?! Can't I like throw jade or something? I am the Jade Dragon! Wait, no! I'm green, that's why..." Zirconios had entered the shop nearly an hour ago. Of course he was still there at this point as well. Currently, he was in distress seeing as he had no way to protect himself.

"What are you doing here?" Ignoring the spasming dragon, Skiadrum approached the group. She still stood a good distance away though.

The dragons were a sight to see at this point. Each was absolutely seething. Igneel was engulfed in flames. Metalicana's whole body had been covered in iron scale and his arm had morphed into a weapon. Grandina was soaring as what seemed like a miniature tornado materialized near her side. As for Skiadrum and Weisslogia, well the two were unseeable, both for different reasons of course.

"I'm just here for pickles. I'm not really in the mood to kill any of you anyway." The man's voice was sore. It sounded as though he had not spoken in years. And to be honest, he probably hadn't. The dragon slayer had holed himself up in that stupid cave for quite some time…

"Are you sure that's all you're here for?" Weisslogia's voice was dangerous. He wasn't sure what to do in the situation. Ever fiber of his being was telling him to kill. But the potential profits…

"He's sure. We're literally just here for pickles." It was in that moment that everyone finally noticed the old woman who had accompanied the dragon. They had completely forgotten about her existence.

"Well um, I guess you two can shop then." Igneel said this hesitantly. He did not rid himself of the flaming aura. But he did untense somewhat.

"Thank you. Now do you have anything special here?" The old woman started a conversation with the fire dragon. As she did this Acnologia began scanning shelves.

"Well, we do have a new prototype. It's called the pickle of youth. Would you like to try it?" Igneel allowed his flames to dissipate. This woman didn't seem to be a threat. So why not ask her to sample one of their new products?

"Sure. I have nothing to worry about if it doesn't work so…" Just as he was about to hand her the specimen, the backroom door swung open. Out popped a wild Jellal followed by Erik.

"Don't do it without us! You know we've wanted to see if that thing really worked!" Jellal shouted this enthusiastically. Erik nodded in agreement.

"Watch away." And then the woman ate the sample. Suddenly she was engulfed in fog. When it finally receded, there stood a beautiful young woman. One with dark hair and an icy aura.

"Ultear!?" Jellal was in shock. The friend he had thought gone forever stood in the middle of the shop. This was like a dream come true.

"Jellal. Good to see you. I'm assuming this worked then? And that guy next to you is a new recruit?" The woman was so casual about the situation. It was strange.

"Yeah, we have quite a few newbies. And thank god you're here! Being a single father is harder than you'd think! Last time a guy tried to flirt with Meredy I almost killed him! I mean, he was in a dark guild we were destroying later that day. But I didn't know that at the time!" The bluenette jumped to hug the woman as he let out this confession. Erik snorted, remembering the particular instance Jellal was referencing. That had been a fun day…

"Uh, Acnologia, are you planning on staying around long? Cause if you are, you'll need to come up with a less recognizable name. Maybe something a little more modern?" Igneel began speaking to the new customer. Ultear listened carefully before responding.

"His name shall be Noel Gia. If he's sticking around that is." The woman wasn't sure what her companion would do. But it was best to prepare for either scenario.

"I am not sure if I would be welcome to stay." The man was not too sure what to do. He was sort of a slaughterer of dragons and slayers alike. There wasn't really a place in society for someone like him.

"My guild specializes in reforming criminals." With that said Ultear turned on her heel and walked to the backroom. Jellal led the way. After a moment of thought, Acnologia followed. Erik sighed and began to turn as well.

"I think he wants to get with her." Igneel was of course implying that Acnologia had a thing for Ultear. It was a ridiculous notion, wasn't it?

"Oh, he does. If the thoughts keep leading there, I am leaving. I need earplugs or something…" Erik then entered the back room, grumbling all the way. He now had two new guild members to hear the thoughts of. Oh joy.

"Well that wasn't strange at all, now was it?" The other dragons could only sigh at their friend's stupidity.

* * *

 **A/N: So? Please don't kill us for the weird Acnologia and Ultear thing. This is a crack fic for a reason! If y'all are too disturbed we'll try to stop. Anyway, we're worried about this chapter so please provide feedback! But remember, every view puts a smile on our face! If anyone wants to help come up with names for new dragon OCs, please try your hand!**


	7. Do We Even Have Wallets?

**A/N: GUESS WHO'S BACK! (Back again) Anyway, we're very sorry for the long wait. It's just that school got in the way and then Thanksgiving came around and well… Plus FINALS! I'm still studying for those little buggers... Hopefully some of you are still reading this story! Honestly guys we spent like two weeks trying to come up with names for our OC's in the chapter. It actually didn't take that long to write… Anyway, we must once again inform everyone that we acknowledge Skiadrum is most likely a male in canon. Yet this is not canon and we chose to make the character female. And as for Grandine, well we chose Grandina as the spelling for this story due to obvious reasons. Honestly, there are so many spellings (Grandine, Grandeeney, Grandeeny, Grandina, just to name a few)**

 **Disclaimer: We own nothing**!

* * *

Deep in the cave where the newly revived dragons resided, trouble was brewing, just like Talorikai was brewing tea. Afterall, that was the water dragon's favorite thing to do. Anyway, some of the more skeptical and logical dragons were having a hard time accepting the reason for their return to the living. How had the odor of pickles brought them to life? It did not make sense. Their confusion had obviously started a feud. Some of the odder and more accepting dragons found it offensive that they would question such a thing. They were alive, that was what was important. So what if pickles were the cause- they were delicious. In all of this glaring remained a few figures who had no opinion on the matter. Zirconios, the Jade Dragon, the one who had already visited the shop quite often, sat and watched the others glare and snarl. He watched them get used to their strange new human limbs, something he had done months ago. After all, Zirconios had been resurrected long before the others. By his side was another, this one with fiery hair. His current companion was clearly unhappy with all of his current company, even the Jade Dragon. He was leaving to find that shop as soon as he could. After all, he did have a 'nephew' to spy on, and an old friend to see.

* * *

"So from what I've gathered, we should all be having grandkids within the next seven years." Igneel looked up from the counter. He had been frantically doing calculations a few moments before. And now they knew why.

"Wendy is thirteen!" Grandina was clearly appalled. The thought of her young daughter having children was not something she wanted to dwell on. Well not right now at least.

"I'm giving her until age twenty. What more do you want!?" The fire dragon seemed strained. He really did sound stressed that Grandina wasn't going along with his calculations. Besides, twenty was plenty old, right?

"Well I suppose that is appropriate." Grandina put some thought into it. If her daughter started dating right away, she could find someone to settle down with by twenty. It was possible. Maybe.

"See! Anyway, this shop is making more money than those theoretical grandchildren would ever be able to spend." Igneel smiled. The shop really was successful. They were making sales to all of Fiore, people would come from far and wide just to see their merchandise. It probably helped that the shop had become the official pickle supplier for the king. Oh, and let's not even get started on all of the sales to Edolas citizens. Keeping that portal was a really good business decision.

"Are you saying we're rich?" Metalicana looked nervous. The idea of having money was strange to him. After all, dragons had no currency.

"Well we're certainly making bank. Being the king's personal pickle supplier does make some money you know." And there it was. Skiadrum was confirming their wealth. She was the most sensible one so surely this meant that everything was true. Not to be rude or anything, but the dragons really couldn't take Igneel's word for things very often.

"True." Grandina would make use of every chance she got to use her catchphrase. Yes, the dragon had finally acknowledged 'true' to be her favorite word.

"So, how many grandkids is everyone hoping for?" The white dragon broke the serious tune to ask this ridiculous question. Not one of them had thought that far into the future... Right?

* * *

JELLAL FERNANDES!" The shop had been graced with a loud BOOM. It was then followed by some rather colorful cursing, signifying to Skiadrum that Jellal was behind the whole mess. The young man had been blowing way too many holes in the shop as of late.

"We're sorry!" The whole guild shouted from the back room. So it hadn't just been their leader to make such a mess then. Interesting.

"Sure you are. That's why you're going to help clean it up." The shadow dragon smirked. The sight was rather terrifying. No one in their right mind would ignore Skiadrum at this point.

"Have fun with that, Jellal." A few of the other members smiled before trying to stealthily slip away. It was clear that they hadn't realized her aggravation extended to them as well.

"Oh, you will too." But now they were aware. Skiadrum had given this order with little to no kindness in her words. They were going to be cleaning up whether they liked it or not.

"Huh?" The more feminine of the males looked appalled at the idea of helping do such a thing. Yup, Macbeth had never even considered he would be put in such a situation.

"You're all helping him." The woman turned away from the disgruntled young man. She had to make sure they all understood what was expected. Richard and Erik looked like they had long ago accepted their fate. Meanwhile Sawyer was glaring at the mop.

"Don't worry, Skai, I'll take him out later if you want me to." The fire dragon was most likely referencing Macbeth. The boy had been intensely glaring at her for quite a while now. Good thing she had long ago grown immune to dirty looks.

"Igneel, just go do something else." Skai sighed. She was just not in the mood to deal with the fire dragon. A bunch of destructive, moody young adults was enough already.

"Whatever you say, Ma'am." And off Igneel went.

* * *

"Yo, we're back!" The doors to the shop nearly flew off their hinges as they were thrown open. Standing in the doorway was our favorite bunch of wizards from Lamia Scale.

"Ah yes, my favorite white haired customer!" Wes was on them almost as soon as he was aware they had arrived. His thing with the color white truly was quite terrifying.

"Hey, Wes. So, do I still get a discount?" Lyon may make his fair share of change while taking missions, but discounts were a beautiful thing. There was no way he would pass up stopping at this shop as long as said discount remained.

"Why of course it does! Any customer with white hair will forever get cheap merchandise." Wes was never going to make anyone with such beautiful hair pay full price. In fact, he considered that tyranny.

"So what's up with the new workers?" One of Lyon's weird friends (whom these authors love) asked as he looked through jars. There were more than five people in the room working. Lamia Scale had only come here once before, but they knew that there had only been five persons employed at the time.

"Those guys? Oh, well Something happened and part of the roof caved in. Since it's Crime Sorciere fault, we're making them clean it up." You see, Crime Sorciere had been semi-legalized. It wasn't official, but they could probably jump into the throne room and ask to be arrested, all while the king acted like they weren't present. The magic council had sort of turned a blind eye to it all. As long as they continued taking out dark guilds, all was well.

"Nice. So uh, when did the Oracion Seis join up?" Sherry recognized a few of the workers from that adventure years back. It was strange to see them acting well… not evil. And yes, she was still hanging out with her friends. Just because she was engaged didn't mean she had to avoid her friends.

"We're not sure. Jellal just came in with them all. Why, do you know them?" The dragon played dumb. He knew all about the whole debacle seeing as somebody wouldn't shut up about it. Yes, the Oracion Seis members held grudges.

"Oh, we've met before." And there was Mister-I-Hold-A-Huge-Grudge. Ah yes, Sawyer was still amazingly bitter about his defeat...

"Racer! Hey look at that, I'm wearing those pants from that lovely experience." Why did Lyon insist on egging on the bitter emotions? It really wasn't going to end well now...

"Completely unnecessary to bring that up right now." Sawyer was already aggravated enough by his cleaning duty. Did this guy really just have to make it worse for him?

"You're obviously just jealous of my style." The ice mage smiled widely. He knew he was just being ridiculous now, but antagonizing people was something he enjoyed a great deal. Too bad it didn't get to do it very often.

"No one cares. Those pants are hideous anyway." The former Oracion Seis just rolled his eyes before grabbing the mop once more. He continued to move swiftly about the room while waiting for a response.

"I like them." The seith mage randomly explained from another side of the shop. He had been listening in on the conversation and honestly thought Lyon's pants were pretty cool.

"See! Bixlow thinks they're cool! I bet in some alternate universe we have a band together where we're known for our awesome pants!" While he had been joking before, now Lyon was completely serious. Finding someone who respected his fashion choices was something he had never even dared to dream of.

"That would never happen. Anyway, it's Sawyer now." The worker finally corrected his nemesis on his name. Racer was gone. Now all that was left was Sawyer. Jellal had made sure of that.

"Are you still holding a grudge against me?" Lyon's question seemed random. But it made perfect sense to the other man. Sawyer really wasn't over the whole debacle many years ago. Of course the ice mage would pick up on his distaste for him.

"Yeah." Sawyer conceded. He really didn't see any point in hiding his angry feelings about the whole situation anymore.

* * *

"Does anyone know what kind of dragon slayer Acnologia is?" In the backroom of the shop, Meredy was gazing curiously at the newest member. They had yet to go on a mission since having him join the guild. So maybe she was more than a little curious about his magic...

"Nope." Midnight didn't even look up from his task. And what was that task, you ask? Why he was fluffing his pillows.

"Not me." Angel just looked at her nails. She was in desperate need of a good manicure.

"I don't think there's anyone old enough to remember." Racer provided this insight. And it was true, Acnologia was ancient. He had spent a few centuries as a dragon at least.

"Great." Cobra sighed before curling up to take a nap. Yes, Macbeth wasn't the only one around who needed to sleep. Besides, it was night time anyway.

Somewhere in the dark recesses of Erik's mind, a strange scene was taking place. The dream starred Acnologia and a very confused version of himself.

"I'm a cloak dragon slayer. There's a reason I joined Crime Sorciere." The serious expression on the mysterious man's face was disorienting. Especially when what he had just said was so ridiculous.

"Huh?" It was the only thing Erik could even muster. The previous conversation warranted nothing more.

"Jellal buys cloaks in bulk. I'll never go hungry!" Suddenly Acnologia looked happy. It was a strange, strange thing indeed.

Cobra felt himself waking up. And so, he said exactly what was on his mind after that whole debacle. "What the fu-"

"Language!" Meredy called from her side of the room. That girl's hearing was too good sometimes. Sure, it was nothing compared to his, but she heard a lot of things either way.

"Meredy, you're worse than all of us." Sawyer responded to the girl's outraged cry with this comeback before promptly falling back to sleep. Poor things had been awoken by the destructive sounds coming from the front room. Igneel was trying to light candles again, it seemed,

"Sorry. I just don't think your first words after waking up should be those." Meredy turned back to Cobra before yawning herself. She then proceeded to fall asleep, leaving Cobra the only one left.

"IGNEEL NO!" It came from the front of the store. Looks like Cobra wasn't going to be getting more sleep anytime soon.

* * *

Meanwhile in another location, someone else was having the same struggles with their overactive imagination.

"I'm the Christmas Tree Dragon Slayer." A strange figure appeared out of nowhere, successfully terrifying Freed.

"What?" Then again, he was still confused. What did this man even mean?

"I'm coming for you next Freed!" The strange figure smirked maliciously before lunging.

"AH!" Freed gasped out as he flew out of bed. He had realized moments ago, that his hair resembled a Christmas Tree. But that was no excuse for such a strange dream.

"Freed, stop screaming." Bixlow. who was laying on the floor, ordered the other man to be quiet. He was just as tired as anyone else would have been at this hour, and his sleep had been interrupted by said screaming.

"Bixlow, why are you in my house?" Freed got over his shock over his friend's presence only to be confused. Why exactly was Bixlow in his home? This made no sense whatsoever…

"I crash on your couch like three days a week. Calm down." The seith mage replied before yawning and heading to the other room once more. That couch was calling to him.

"You do not!" Freed wasn't too sure what Bixlow was talking about. He had never even been in Freed's house as far as the man was concerned. So why was Bixlow navigating his way around like he really did sleep here three times a week?

"I do too." Was all his strange friend said before falling asleep. Freed then realized that there was no point in questioning these things. Bixlow was, well, Bixlow. The man was strange, and there was no explaining his behavior.

* * *

The next morning resulted in the discovery of a few more dream victims from the night before. And when one was plagued with such strange images, they just had to tell someone else.

"Rogue, it was horrible." Sting Eucliffe was attempting to tell his best friend about his dream from the night before. Sadly, the shadow dragon slayer wasn't paying him too much attention.

"Sting, it was just a dream." Rouge sighed at his friend. Sting always seemed to over exaggerate things. This dream was probably no different.  
"But Rogue!" The blonde gazed at his companion sadly. Why wouldn't Rouge just allow him to get this dream out in the open?

"Fine. What happened exactly?" And that right there cued the flashback.

-Dream-

 _"I'm a dragon slayer dragon slayer." A strange figure practically growled when he spoke. He was looking at Sting as though he was something to eat. And apparently, he was._

 _"Is that even possible?" The white dragon slayer looked conflicted. For one, he did not believe this man. But then again, maybe he was what he claimed to be._

 _"It sure is! I've already eaten your friend for power!" The figure roared with laughter. He was dead serious, it seemed._

 _"Which one?" Sting stumbled around his words. Which one of his dear dragon slayer friends had suffered such a horrid fate._

 _"ALL OF THEM!" And then the ma_ n lunged as to eat Sting.

-End Dream-

"So yeah." Sting nodded his head after explaining everything. It seemed he had been right earlier, the dream was horrid.

"Okay, what did you eat yesterday?" Rogue really needed to find what the source of this dream was. There was no way Sting's mind would have just come up with it randomly. As imaginative as his friend could be, this was just an all new level of weird.

"Nothing out of the ordinary." The man seemed to ponder this for a moment. "Well I did eat some of Bixlow's soup yesterday when I ran into him and Freed."

"That should explain everything then." The dragon slayer would never understand what had possessed his friend to eat something concocted by Bixlow. It was common knowledge that anything he made was going to affect you in some way.

* * *

And in another part of Fiore, another was recounting their lovely dream from the night before.

"I'm the book dragon slayer! Here you go, Levy!" A figure threw something to another before disappearing.

"Ouch!" The pained yelp stood out against the otherwise quiet dreamscape.

"Lucy, I'm serious though. It was terrifying." A worried looking Levy McGarden finished recounting her dream. Lucy looked at her quietly for a moment.

"Why is everyone having dreams about dragon slayers all of a sudden?" The blonde finally spoke. A few days ago, some random civilians had commented on having dreams of dragon slayers. And then on her job, Erza had as well. What was going on?

"I'm not sure, but I really did wish I knew what was up with this strange phenomenon." Levy looked very determined. She wanted to understand why this was happening, and she wanted to know soon.

"Tell me if you figure out what's going on. I don't want to deal with a weird dream like that." Lucy had yet to experience one of the dragon slayer dreams. And she was hoping to make it through the year without ever having one.

"Cause you obviously like your dreams about Natsu more." Levy laughed She wasn't going to pass up a chance to tease Lucy, no matter what they had been talking about moments before.

"Levy McGarden!" The celestial wizard could only gape in shock. Even though this happened often, she was still never expecting the smaller girl to say things like that.

"It's the truth though!"

* * *

"Our kids!" Weisslogia looked excited. He had been gazing out the shop window for nearly an hour now.

"That is literally just your son. Calm down." Skiadrum scolded him. She had only seen her son twice since they opened the shop, and the only visible child through the window belonged to Wes. There was no reason for him to be so excited.

"Does my son ever go anywhere without yours?" Wes unleashed the logical argument. He had never once seen Sting without his companion. Since they had opened the shop, that is.

"OUR SONS!" The shadow dragon seemed to have had the same thought. Her son was coming for a visit!

"I KNOW!" The white dragon shouted as well. He and Skiadrum were practically jumping with joy at this point.

The doors opened quietly this time. It was perhaps the first occasion when they had not been dramatically flung open as if announcing the presence of the customer. This could only mean one thing, Skiadrum's child had been the one to open the doors.

"Hello, and welcome back." The woman looked up from her desk and greeted the new arrivals. Her excitement had calmed down a great deal in the few seconds since we last saw her.

"We haven't seen you two in here for quite some time." Wes chimed in from the side of the shop. They were the only two workers present at the moment. Grandina had taken Metalicana and Igneel out to eat a little while ago.

"We've been busy. I mean running a guild is not as easy as everyone seems to think it should be." Sting sighed heavily. His face did light up upon seeing the various jars of pickles though.

"Ah, completely understandable. To the right of the door is a shelf with our new merchandise." Skiadrum informed the boys. They had gotten so many new kinds of pickles since their last visit. One of them was of course, the youth variety which they had tested on Oldtear. But those were only sold to specific people.

"Cool." And so they boys raced over to the shelves to look at all of the new products. Meanwhile, Skiadrum and Weisslogia began one of their ridiculous arguments.

"Besides, Ign- Iggy, yeah Iggy. Iggy got to do this yesterday!" The first part of their conversation had been cut off. But now it seemed that Wes was trying to get permission to do something outrageous.

"Well Iggy is an- Oh my god that is literally the cutest thing I have ever seen in my life!" The female dragon had started speaking with the intention of insulting the fire dragon. She had completely changed her attention to a different being upon locking eyes with it.

"Fro think so too!" Was all the response she received.

"Guys, you'll never believe it! Skiadrum was acting like a girl earlier!" Hours later, the other three dragons returned. Wes was quick to engage them in conversation.

"Wes, if you haven't noticed, I am a female." Skiadrum scowled at him. So what if she had found the cat cute.

"Yeah but you're often violent and sadistic." Grandina provided this tidbit of information. She was trying to get her friend to understand that the other dragon had meant no harm with his words.

"And that makes me less female because…?" The shadow dragon waited for an answer.

"It doesn't. You just don't act much like other girls. Take Grandina for example." Weisslogia provided her with this response. And it made sense. Skiadrum did act quite different from other females of her species.

"Excuse me but she is also violent. That woman is terrifying." Igneel chimed in with this comment. It seemed to appease Grandina, knowing that she was still viewed as a semi-threat.

"Okay, so what was she acting girly over earlier?" Metalicana attempted to change the subject. From what he could tell, the previous conversation may have been leading to an intense battle.

"Her son brought in his adorable little cat!" Wes exclaimed happily. He could still picture those two wonderful exceeds. They were the perfect companions for the children.

"He likes to be called a frog!" Skiadrum glared at the other dragon. She could not believe he would just ignore the little guy's preferences like that!

"See, she's already so enamored with that thing!" Igneel let out a shout of glee. So Skiadrum really could be kind, what a surprise!

"Grandina, where did you find that picture?" The sky dragon was currently holding an image of Frosch. Where she had gotten it was a mystery to the others.

"Skiadrum had one in her wallet. Wait, do we even have wallets?" The woman explained. Her expression changed to one of wonder upon the mentioning of wallets.

"I am not sweeping up that crumbling fourth wall!" Wes replied to the wallet comment very quickly. He had already had to sweep up crumbs a few chapters ago, and he had hated it.

"What are you talking about?" The others all looked confused and concerned. After a moment of silence from both sides, they went back to their previous topic of conversation.

"Yeah, I want to know where you got the picture of that cat." Metalicana turned to Skiadrum. Her possession of the picture was never explained. There was no way she could have snapped a photo and gotten it developed already… Or was that even how things worked in this world?

"Well my son carries them around." The woman answered his question in a very matter-of-fact tone. It wasn't like she had done something strange to get the photo. It had been, well no, she had stolen it from her son, but that didn't really matter right now, did it?

"Like a proud father then?"

* * *

"And she was the most adorable little kid." Mystogan sighed happily. He was lost in nostalgic memories of his travels in Fiore.

"Well she is my daughter." Grandina also sighed in a happy tone. Talking about Wendy was one of her favorite things to do.

"Well I did raise her." The man seemed to get rather defensive. He had taken care of Wendy while she was rather young, there was no ignoring that fact.

"Aha, I raised her first." The sky dragon glared. Why was it that every one of their tea sessions ended up in arguments like this?

"Are you two fighting over Wendy again?" Another bluenette came out of the other room to face the two. He had grown used to their arguing, but honestly, was it really necessary? Why couldn't they both accept the fact that Wendy was independent now?

"Can it, Jellal." The sky dragon turned her attention from Mystogan to the other man. Clearly they were not arguing over Wendy. They were just discussing her childhood.

"Well Mystogan, you may want to jump behind the counter." Jellal seemed rather concerned about the other man's location. And he had a reason to be.

"Why would I do that?" The Edolas King looked confused. There was really no need for him to hide, right?

"Wendy is about to open the shop door." Grandina supplied the information this time. She had smelt her daughter's approach a while ago, but hadn't expected her arrival for a few more minutes.

"No she's no- Bye!" Mystogan seemed to realized exactly where Wendy was seeing as he leaped behind the counter. Thankfully, nothing was knocked over in the process.

"I win!" Grandina shouted triumphantly. The first to leave the argument was the loser, that was how these things worked. Seeing as Mystogan had 'disappeared', she was the winner.

"No way, I will put on a fake moustache and come out if you really want to play that game." The Edolas man glared. He had no qualms about continuing his 'conversation' with the woman.

"Fine, we'll continue this later." Grandina relented. She couldn't exactly blame Mystogan for hiding. It was a necessary precaution.

"Mystogan, scoot over!" Jellal seemed to realize his presence was probably just as bad as Mystogan's. And so, he too leapt behind the counter before Wendy could enter. Thank goodness the scent of pickles would distract the young woman from smelling her childhood companion.

The doors were flung open by a small white figure. It was a cat that had entered in front of Wendy, it appeared.

"Carla, I've been here before, it's completely safe." The girl seemed to be arguing with her cat. A cat who was often times overprotective.

"Wendy, I can not believe you left without consulting me first." Carla sighed deeply. Wendy was just simply not old enough to be going off alone like that!

"It's not like I was alone! Romeo came with me." The girl tried to quell her friend's distress. She knew it wasn't always safe to do things alone, and that was why she had brought Romeo with her.

"Wendy! How could you go out alone with a boy and think nothing of it!?" Carla looked worried. What if something had happened during that outing? What would Wendy have done?

"Carla, it's fine. We're friends." Wendy smiled at her companion once again. She was clearly trying to reassure her that she knew what she was doing.

"Hmp. Well Wendy I simply can not understand why you did not just take me along with you." That seemed the be the last Carla had to say on the matter. The two grabbed what Wendy had come to get, and left quietly.

* * *

The doors were once again flung open as two large figures entered. One seemed exasperated with the way the other had chosen to enter.

"Welcome back." Metalicana was content with this. His son was once again standing in the shop. It had been far too long since he had seen his child.

"Sup." The dragon slayer went to search through all of the jars provided. He was clearly looking for something in particular. "Hey Lily, can you check the shelves over there?"

"Sure thing, Gajeel." And so, the exceed began searching. It did not take long however, for his large form to time out. At least this way he would be able to see the lower shelves no problem.

"What just happened?" Metalicana could almost swear he had just seen that cat shrink down to what he was now. It made no sense.

"He's got a larger form for combat. Or training." The dragon slayer answered the question as he continued to shuffle through jars. He had forgotten that seeing Lily do such a thing wasn't normal for most people.

"Which we were doing before you ran off." Lily was definitely making a jab at his companion. Leaving training wasn't something he had expected Gajeel to do. And yet, here they were.

"Hey, I smelled pickles and you very well know that I can't concentrate when that happens." Gajeel tried to redirect the exasperation. He couldn't help but come here once the smell had reached him.

"I suppose that is true." The exceed relented before following the other out of the shop.

"My kid's cat is amazing!" Metalicana shouted with glee as soon as he was sure the two were out of hearing range.

* * *

"Freed, why exactly are you hiding out in our shop?" Igneel had looked behind the desk to see the green haired man. Not that he wasn't welcome, but why was he there?

"I'm trying to get away from Gildarts." Freed responded without missing a beat. He had been running for hours and figured he could rest in the shop for a short while.

"You're hiding from Gildarts in our shop?" Metalicana asked the question rather slowly. This was the only way he was able to contain his laughter.

"I'm gonna tell him." Igneel shouted jollily. He loved crushing hopes and dreams, just not as much as Skiadrum did. But she was out somewhere with Weisslogia so the honor would fall upon him.

"Don't you even dare!" Grandina smacked the fire dragon in the back of the head. She was hoping it would deter him from speaking any more.

"Anyway, he's trying to have me measured for a dress!" Freed sounded even more distressed than before. He was practically shaking in horror at this point.

"Well that doesn't really shock me all that much…" Igneel trailed off. He knew what he had just said was rude and tried to cover it up by acting innocent.

"I do not partake in wearing women's clothing!" But Freed had heard and the damage was done. His anger was redirected from Gildarts to the fire dragon.

"Fine, you can hide here. But it's essential you know that Gildarts comes out here daily. So yeah, you're not actually that safe." Metalicana was the one to finally break the news to him. As soon as he was finished informing the Fairy Tail mage, Metalicana walked to the desk to grab the order of potato seeds he would soon need.

Before Freed could even attempt to leave the building, the doors were flung open once again. The man who entered was none other than the Mr. Clive whom Freed had hoped to escape. There was no hope for him now. "So you have my potato- Oh, there you are, Freed!"

"NOOOOO!" The man was dragged out of the shop by a very happy Gildarts. He had his potato seeds, and he had his decoy princess. What more could he ever hope for?

"Have a nice day!"

* * *

Meanwhile, somewhere in the distance, two figures were making their way to the shop. They moved at brisk pace, making a lot of progress in a short while.

"Hey, we're almost there!" The male of the group sounded excited about the whole thing.

"Can it, Sparky! We're not even to Magnolia yet!" The female was more pessimistic. If they were not in the right town, they were not close to the destination. Or so that was her philosophy.

"A guy can dream!" The male sounded hurt as they continued moving forward.

"You dream too hard if you think whining is ever going to win me over!"

"Why are you so mean!?" The male whined once again, further proving the woman's point.

"Why do you always follow me around?" The female replied very casually. She had definitely been holding this comeback in her arsenal for a moment just like this one.

"Touche." The male could only put his head down, admitting defeat. He truly did follow the woman everywhere she went.

* * *

Back in Magnolia, the desired destination of many a dragon, we meet with some of our favorite members of Fairy Tail.

"We're almost there!" A gleeful sound escaped Natsu's mouth as he ran a few steps ahead of his friend. The shop was almost in sight.

"Aye!" Happy supported his friends comment with his usual response. Ah Happy, and the word Aye went hand in hand, didn't they?

"Calm down you guys, we're just going grocery shopping." Lucy tried to get the boys to stop acting so crazy. When they got excited like this, things usually exploded. Her rent was due, and she didn't have any money to spare to pay for damages they could cause.

"At a pickle shop!" Happy exclaimed excitedly. He had yet to visit the shop, so this was a very big deal to him.

"That's not actually as exciting as you seem to think it is." Lucy sighed. Why did the simplest things make these two so happy? And why was Natsu so in love with pickles? From what she gathered it was a dragon thing, but still…

"But the workers are nice!" Natsu was trying to justify his excitement. This was the only thing he could think of at the moment other than the obvious comment about the merchandise sold.

"Sure." Lucy had to agree with his assessment. The workers had been rather friendly last time she had visited. But she just knew the owners had to be hiding something.

"And Happy hasn't been there yet. That's important." Natsu broke her train of thought with this comment. She definitely hadn't been expecting to hear that come out of his mouth.

"Wait, you took me there before you took Happy?" Now why had he done that? Happy was the one out of the two of them who would have better understood the boy's excitement. And yet, he had taken her. Strange indeed, but then again the circumstances behind her last visit were rather odd.

"NaLu!" The cat shouted joyfully into the sky. He was way too happy about whatever this NaLu thing was to be healthy.

"Happy, what does that even mean?" Natsu and Lucy both looked at the exceed. They were completely clueless about the origin of the word and needed Happy to explain.

"It means nothing! Don't look at me!" Happy was in to dramatics today, it seemed. Maybe he would tell them later when he calmed down.

The doors were flung open courtesy of Natsu. But when they moved, the three were met with a shocking sight.

"Uh, this is not what it looks like." Erza quickly tried to deflect the suspicious glances they were giving her. So what f she was in this shop? It's not like the dragons slayers owned it or anything.

"Erza, you're buying cake at a pickle shop." Lucy said this in a very dry tone. There was no way this couldn't be what it looked like.

"Okay fine, this is what it looks like." The girl conceded. She was a failure at acting and there was no way she would ever be able to convince Lucy the cake was for a friend.

"I thought you had moved on!" The celestial mage truly had. Erza hadn't been to the bakery in weeks and Lucy had dared to believe that her addiction had been stopped. Apparently it had only gotten worse.

"But cake." The red head gazed down at the box in her arms with a longing look. She loved cake more than almost anything.

"I see your point. Proceed." Cake was something that everyone loved. So what if Erza was practically addicted to it? She deserved a little slack.

So with that said, Erza finally exited. After she had left, one of the workers turned to face the newcomers. This was none other than Igneel, or Iggy if you somehow managed to forget. "Welcome! We haven't seen you two around here in a while now."

"Oh hey, Iggy. Natsu always drags me off on jobs so…" Lucy answered for the group. She hadn't actually been in Magnolia for longer than a few hours at a time for a couple of weeks now. Natsu had been dragging her on a continual stream off jobs. Some were worse than others, but they had all ended in destructive and a reduction of payment.

"I do not always drag you off on jobs!" Natsu seemed to think this was the truth. But it was painfully obvious to anyone else that he really did drag her off on jobs much too often.

"Natsu, you do make Lucy go on a lot of jobs. I would know." Happy spoke up from his perch on one of the shelves. How he had gotten up there, no one would ever know.

"Happy, I thought you were on my side!" The dragon slayer was in shock. The cat almost never sided against him.

"Not when you're wrong." The exceed explained his change of allegiance in as simple a way as he possibly could. Sure, he loved agreeing with Natsu, but sometimes that boy was so wrong it was laughable.

"Happy, I don't think you've ever been on my side before!" She was overjoyed. Perhaps this meant Happy would finally stop calling her fat. It was actually really bad for her self esteem, you know. Now if only Happy would realize that…

"Lucy, this is a one time deal, okay? Natsu is usually right. You got lucky." The exceed sounded rather malicious. It was as though he truly was attempting to be rude.

"Happy, remember what we talked about." The fire dragon slayer looked at his friend. Happy sighed before turning back to face the blonde.

"Right. Sorry, Lucy. I'm just letting out my bitter feelings about the obliviousness of NaLu out on you." Happy seemed almost robotic in his response. It was as though he had practiced this answer multiple times before using it.

"What is a NaLu?" Once again, the girl asked the same question. Lucy was getting rather irritated about not knowing what the word meant. Perhaps she would ask Levy later…

"Nothing yet. That's why I'm so bitter." The cat looked so sad in that moment. Many would have agreed to do anything, even murder, just to make sure that expression would never again grace the face of the usually joyful cat. It was that bad.

"Happy, what is wrong with you today?" Lucy asked this hesitantly. She wanted to make sure he was okay before she did anything else.

"Nothing. Just buy some pickles."

* * *

"Lahar! I thought you lived in Edolas now." Jellal Fernandes looked frightened, and a little upset. While the jailer had been nice to have around to help with recruits, his stalking had gotten out of hand. And so, Jellal had dared to dream that the man would never return from Edolas.

"Oh I do. But I met my Edolas self and had to come back here to get a few things." The man fixed his glasses and adjusted a sack he was holding. It didn't look very full, but no one could tell what was inside.

"Are you guys really similar then?" One of the dragons decided to get involved. That dragon just so happened to be Grandina. She spent enough time around both versions of the bluenette to realize their personalities were virtually the same. And so she wondered if any others had the same situation going.

"Nope. He hates Mystogan, and by extension, Jellal. Therefore he must die." A burning fire seemed to light in Lahar's eyes. He looked determined, and ruthless. His counterpart stood absolutely no chance. "I must be going now, but Jellal, I will be coming back to visit you every now and then. Goodbye." And so he was gone like the wind.

* * *

"Sup guys! Betcha missed us!" The doors to the shop were flung open, definitely not for the first time. It seemed like everyone just had to make dramatic entrances nowadays. But what was different than usual were the two people standing in the shop.

"Your life can now have meaning!" Whichever one had not already spoken did so now. The two then waited for a reaction from the shop owners.

"Raiolyn, Avvelenare! What are you two doing here?" Grandina was in shock. She hadn't expected to see her friends again for many years.

"We were bored." Avvelenare answered the rhetorical question. And she had answered honestly. They really had been just that, bored.

"Yeah and Avvelenare kept hitting me so…" It really wasn't necessary to say this. Everyone had just assumed the same thing Rai just said. Avvie was quite harsh with him, that much was true.

"You deserved it!" The poison dragon glared at her companion. He had tried hitting on her so she had hit him. She had been provoked!

"Nuh uh! All I did was ask you out." Rai tried to defend his actions. He liked Avvie, he had loved her for years. And yet, the girl wasn't sold on him.

"You do that all the time! I'm not going to say yes, just get that through your head!" Avvie had had this conversation with Rai one too many times. He really just needed to move on. I mean Kaneqkorah, another dragon, seemed to like Raiolyn enough. So why couldn't he just go for her?

"You guys really don't ever change, do you?" Metalicana sighed. Avvie and Rai were perhaps some of the most predictable of the bunch. Arguing like a married couple was just about their favorite pass time.

"So, how do you like our new looks?" The female dragon redirected the conversation to her human form. Rai's too, of course.

"Very nice. Interesting hair, Avvie." Skiadrum answered kindly. And it was truthful. Avvelenare's hair stood up quite strangely. But hey, a ton of people had spiky hair so…

"Why thank you! Sparky over here told me he didn't like the color." This was true. Rai had decided to go and be rude about it as well. Why he would say such a thing to her, she was unsure. It really wasn't helping his case at all.

"Rai, why would you do that? I thought you were trying to win her over!" Even Igneel realized his comment had to have been detrimental to the development of his romantic relationship with Avvie. A relationship that would never actually exist though.

"I am! She's just kind of mean! Besides, what was I supposed to say? Something like 'Damn girl, you fine!' Yeah, that would go over so well with her." Rai rolled his eyes. He knew he hadn't been the kindest earlier, but he was just trying to be honest. The color was quite strange.

"Doesn't mean you have to be rude!" Igneel scolded the other dragon once more. And Rai did acknowledge he could have been kinder about the situation. Maybe he did like her hair and it was just the fact that she was a smidgen taller than him, that was aggravating…

"Shut up, guys. So he said he didn't like the color?" Skiadrum and Grandina listened intently for a response. They were fond of the color actually. And it complimented the woman's appearance quite nicely. So why had Rai said it was hideous?

"Yes. I rather like it though." The poison dragon nodded in confirmation. She looked solemn while thinking of the insult from earlier.

"It's funny, we have a boy in the back room with the same colored hair!" Weisslogia joined in on the girls' conversation. Pointing out the similarity between Avvie and the boy's hair seemed to startle the girls for a moment before they were nodding in agreement.

"Tell me more." Upon hearing about the boy, Avvelenare's whole demeanour changed. She was no longer upset. Instead she looked excited, yet determined.

"Well he's a wizard so he gets into his fair share of trouble." Weisslogia started to describe the boy's life. Being a mage was something important to note. People without magic just weren't as fun for some reason.

"Life is more fun that way, of course." Avvie confirmed the thought. She knew the kind of trouble magic could cause. It was so destructive…

"True. Oh, he's a dragon slayer!" Grandina got really excited after sharing this news. She seemed to have realized something amazing.

"What kind!?" Avvie's curiosity was piqued once again. She needed to know as much as possible about this kid and his magic.

"Poison." Skiadrum was the one to share this little fact. Realizing what she had just said, the woman looked just as excited as her old friend.

"LEAD ME TO THIS CHILD NOW! I AM ADOPTING HIM!" Avvie's joy could no longer be contained. There was a poison dragon slayer in the shop who just so happened to have the same color hair as her. It was almost as if fate had a hand in these events.

"Avvie, calm down!" Igneel tried to get the woman to stop freaking out. Last time he had gotten that excited, they hadn't had a roof for a few weeks. Who knew what damage the female dragon could do if not restrained.

"NO WAY! I'VE ALWAYS WANTED TO BE A MOM, LEAD THE WAY!" Avvie attempted to have Grandina guide her to the back room mentioned before. She just had to meet this kid!

"Well if that's what you really want then we could-" Rai suavely cut into the conversation. He saw a chance, and so he took it...

"Watch yourself, Sparky. Say one more word and I will attack."..Only to be faced with rejection once again! Now isn't that a surprise!?

"Nevermind then. Continue to spazz over a kid you've never met before." Rai actually squeaked. An excited Avvie was somehow much more terrifying than an angry Avvie. It made absolutely no sense, but Rai just chose to accept the facts as they were.

"CAN YOU ALL STOP YELLING! SENSITIVE HEARING HERE!" A voice called out from the backroom. And it was angry.

"I SMELL POISON! IS THAT HIM!?" Avvie squealed, but calmed down upon remembering the request from a few moments ago. She would calm down for this kid, and this kid only.

"Yeah." Metalicana answered her question before heading to the front desk, knowing he needed to get some merchandise ready. Gildarts would be in within the next hour or two.

"Yo, poison kid! Do you have parents?" Avvie was significantly quieter this time. She didn't want to scare the kid off too fast.

"No." The drab reply came from the other room. The tone used was laced with more than a hint of apprehension.

"His name is Erik." Igneel informed the woman before pausing. "Or Cobra, depending on which stage of his life you met him in." He suddenly remembered what Erik had been doing previous to joining Crime Sorciere.

"I'm gonna be your mom now, okay!?" Avvie's excitement only seemed to grow now that she had a name to put to the voice. There was no stopping her quest to be acknowledged as a parental figure now.

"Whatever." Erik's response was followed by a quiet sigh. It seemed he had made the right choice and given up on fighting against the poison dragon's will.

"YAY! From now on I shall be referred to as Cobra's Mom. Or Erik's Mom if you would." Avvelenare addressed her friend group with this new development. She had decided that if she was going to be a stand in mother for the boy, people needed to know.

"Seriously Avvie?" Rai looked so exasperated in that moment. He had been putting up with his friend for years, and the woman's behavior never ceased to amuse him.

"You're just jealous I get to be a stand in mother and you don't!" The female looked pissed. Apparently Rai's tone had sounded too amused and now he had an angry poison dragon to deal with, Well, there was only one thing to do now.

"One, I am male, and second, you're right." Rai laughed it off and made light of the situation. Although he truly was upset about not being able to parent a child. It really didn't matter whose kid it was at this point.

Suddenly the door to the back room swung open and two males exited. They seemed to be in a very bitter and cynical mood. Nothing too new then.

"So another meeting next week then?" The blonde male looked to his companion. The other nodded in response.

"Yeah, unless Jellal makes us go on a wizard hunt again." The man went on to explain possible setbacks. No one was ever too sure when Jellal would be calling on them. It was always good to make sure none of your plans were concrete.

"Or if one of us pulls a Gajeel and gets their own cat." Laxus snorted. He still couldn't believe that the other guy had betrayed them like that.

"That would go against everything I stand for." Cobra sighed sadly. He too, was upset about their fellow member's departure from their ranks.

"He's a lightning dragon slayer." Igneel had noticed Rai eyeing the blonde boy as if trying to decipher who he was. And so, the fire dragon had filled him in on the interesting fact.

"Yes! Do you have parents by any chance?" Rai's face filled with excitement as he addressed Laxus. He was actually getting the chance to be a stand in parent!

"I have a dad." Laxus replied rather smoothly and coldly. The young man seemed to want to glare at something that wasn't even there.

"Oh." Rai was crestfallen. His hope had just been stomped into the ground.

"But I hate him so…" Laxus trailed off. He enjoyed informing everyone of just how much he hated his father.

"Yay! I'm going to be your dad now, okay?" The dragon jumped up excitedly and sent the comment toward Laxus. There was a strange look shared between Erik and the other dragon slayer. Their day had been awfully odd….

"What is wrong with all of you?" Laxus couldn't help but let that out. Every time he came into this shop something strange happened.

"I didn't hear a no!"

* * *

"So how long are you guys going to be in town for?" Skiadrum was all business as she questioned her friends. Sure, it was great to Avvie and Rai, but she needed to know how long they were going to be around. Or more specifically, if she needed to prepare a couple extra bedrooms.

"Ah we were planning on staying over here tonight." Avvelenare answered for the two. She had decided they would be staying for a night the second they entered Magnolia. It had been a long journey and this human form was tired.

"Then we were going to go back to the cave for a while." Rai put this in there. He had Avvie had been sharing a cave since they were extremely young. It was there home, and they could never leave for too long without returning.

"But of course we'll still be visiting every week or so." Avvie was adamant about this. She refused to ignore her friends after having not seen them in months. They had spent seven years in each others company, and while she still had Rai, it was strange not to see the other five every day.

"Sound good to you guys?" The male dragon awaited a response. He knew it would be a positive one seeing as not many people were capable of saying no to Avvie. The poison dragon either scared them or endeared them.

"Oh yeah, sure. Just don't destroy half the store every time you come to visit unlike some people." Grandina seemed to be glaring at the top of one of the shelves. It looked odd to Avvie and Rai, but the others knew exactly why she was doing so.

"Who then?" Rai's curiosity was piqued. He needed to know who this absolutely horrid guest was.

"Jade. Oh wait no, Jay Dee." Igneel had let the name slip out. It was hilarious considering how flustered their friend had been the first time he stopped by.

"Huh?" Right. They had forgotten the others wouldn't understand their 'human' names.

"Zirconios. The kids had met him before so he had to come up with a fake name. Let's just say he's lacking in the creativity department." And now it all made sense. Zirconios would be the one to come up with a name like that. And their green friend would also be the one to stand on top of a shelf while visiting. Suddenly Grandina's anger toward the shelving unit made perfect sense.

"Hasn't he always been lacking?" Metalicana put this as a question, although they all agreed. Intelligence and creativity were always things the jade dragon had struggled with. Poor thing.

"Very true. So is anyone else planning on visiting anytime soon?" Skiadrum changed the subject. She had come to realize that if Zirconios was alive, then the others certainly were as well. If anyone else came to visit, they'd have to explain all of the rules and regulations. Thankfully Avvie and Rai had never taken too much joy in eating humans, oh and their level of destructiveness was pretty low for a couple of dragons.

"Well currently all of those who were once dead are still getting used to being alive again. With the exception of Zirconios of course." Avvie answered her question after some thought. She couldn't imagine how odd it must be to have to relearn how to use your body. Oh, and the poor things would also have to learn how to use their human forms!

"They'll probably be by once they figure out how to work their human forms." Rai and Avvie seemed to think on the same wavelength. He had come to the same conclusion as she just had.

"It is quite difficult to get used to not having wings, isn't it?" The others all nodded in agreement. Realizing you couldn't fly everywhere anymore was just downright sad.

"Anyway, the others who were at the council meeting are hoping to make their way over here sometime soon as well. Although I am sure that some of them will try and make sure you don't recognize them." The council meeting. Rai cringed slightly every time it was brought up. After all, most of the meeting had been spent putting him down…

"They do realize we can all smell each other from miles away, right?" Weisslogia looked frustrated. Why was everyone always looking over these things? I mean, the only reason the kids hadn't picked up on their parent's smells was because of the origin of the shop. Pickles distracted the kids from any and all other smells on the premises. Of course our favorite five dragons had developed a tolerance and could now block out the scent of pickles.

"No, I don't think they do." Avvie sighed sadly.

"Idiots. The lot of them." Igneel snorted. Those guys had the most ridiculous ideas and looked over such obvious facts…

* * *

"What happened!?" Skiadrum and the others had entered the shop only to met with a falling light. Yes, it had been ripped out of the ceiling by one means or another. She now realized that leaving Crime Sorciere (Minus its female members) and the male dragons alone in the shop was a terrible idea. It was probably one of the worst ideas she had ever had.

"Well you left us alone!" And there it was. Igneel was calling her out on it. Judging by the flaming hole in the wall, he hadn't tried very hard to keep things under control in her absence.

"What did you expect to happen?!" Metalicana chimed in with his own condemning tone. He was just as sure as Igneel that this all had to be her fault.

"How could you do this to us!?" Wes sounded incredibly distressed. He seemed to think that Skiadrum had left them alone so that they would kill each other in their stupidity.

"Calm down. We just went on a day trip to the spa with the girls." Grandina tried to direct the anger and sadness away from Skiadrum. I mean they were allowed to take a small break from the shop if they wanted to!

"But we can't function if you guys aren't here!" Igneel's claim could be considered true. It was slightly difficult for the boys to get anything done unless they were being screamed at.

"You're the only things keeping us from doing some really stupid things!" Weisslogia joined in once again. And he was completely right. The dragons all had stupid ideas sometimes. But Grandina and Skiadrum were the only ones who would put a stop to those thoughts before they become actions.

"Okay, I will admit that we are. But someone needs to explain what happened while we were gone." Grandina accepted Wes' comment and moved on to more important things. Why was half the wall glowing? And what was with the new iron floor?

"I would also like to know what that mural is about." Skiadrum was staring at the ceiling. For some reason, there was a painting up there. A good painting sure enough, but why on the ceiling? The only explanation that anyone could muster was that Igneel had something to do with it.

"And I need to know why Macbeth is wearing my hair curlers." Sorano had finally seen inside the shop. She had lagged behind the rest of the group in order to speak with her newly acquired friend. Yes, they had met at the spa. The two girls had discovered they had extremely similar personalities. Anyway, the bottom line is that Angel was looking at Midnight who truly was sporting hair curlers.

"You never use them Sorano." The tired looking male responded to her question and went to the back room to take a nap. With those curlers and a bit of beauty sleep, he would be good to go the next day.

"And now I never can." The sad girl whispered this. So what if she hadn't used the curlers yet! It didn't mean she didn't want to persay. But she was never touching them again now. Stupid Midnight and his quest for perfect beauty!

"Erik, you should have been able to prevent this!" Ultear looked appalled. No, not at the destruction. She was disturbed by the fact that she was associated with such a guild. Why couldn't they control themselves for a few hours? Surely even Fairy Tail was capable of that!

"How so?" The dragon slayer looked toward the door awaiting a response. Of course he didn't actually have to wait. He'd know as soon as she thought up a reason. There was a silence and a pointed glare from the woman. He responded to her thoughts quickly. "I can't hear everything. People have beat me in a fight before you know."

"I will give you that. But please just tell me why you didn't try to stop this disaster when it started." Ultear took his response into account. But honestly, the minute Igneel started setting things on fire, Cobra really should have been able to stop things.

"Well I was going ot. But then I remembered this disturbing thing from earlier so I didn't. And then it just got too funny." And that was that. Oh how the guild had suffered without Ultear...

* * *

A/N: So I hope you found some entertainment in that mess of a chapter. We went into it without the slightest bit of a plan. Once again, we are very sorry for the wait. Just to make sure everyone's clear on the dragon OC's, Avvelenare is a female poison dragon. She and Raiolyn, a male lightning/thunder dragon, travel together. Raiolyn is referred to as Sparky by Avvelenare and Rai (pronounced like the type of bread) by most of the other characters. Avvelenare has dubbed herself Cobra's Mom (Erik's Mom as well), but many of the other dragons call her Avvie (Pronounced like Abby but with 'v' sounds replacing the 'b'). These two won't be permanent fixtures but will come around every now and then. Since we clearly can not go with the canon reason for the dragons' disappearances, Rai and Avvie help to explain things. So yes, we came up with an utterly ridiculous reason for their leaving. Remember, this is a crack fic. All will be revealed in due time. Please tell us what you think! Oh, and I doubt Gildarts will actually overthrow the king in this story, but it could be a quick little one shot we whip up, so if you're interested let us know. Also, Edolas characters will start appearing very soon. If there's anyone you were hoping to see, just let us know!


	8. Where Have We Been?

**A/N: Sorry this took so long everyone. Between school and other responsibilities, there really was no time to write. Hopefully the next chapter will get cranked out at a more decent time. And yeah, we're super sorry about the wait, oh my goodness. Now as always I must go over the whole gender and spelling thing, but I suppose you have all seen it by now so… Please enjoy and tell us what you think!**

 **Disclaimer: We own nothing**

* * *

Back in the abyss with all of the newly resurrected dragons, the numbers were decreasing. Each dragon was beginning to make his or her way out into the world once more. Luckily, Avvie and Rai had been by weeks before to deter them from eating humans. Apparently all feared Avvelenare's poison, and did not wish to evoke her rage. So yeah, no one would be eating humans anytime soon. But the significance of the decreasing number was in the most recent four to leave. They went in pairs, none wanting to travel alone after such a long stretch of solitude. Both groups were headed to the shop, but taking different routes. They would not be arriving as one.

* * *

"I SMELL TALORIKAI AND DYZEKAJ!" Weisslogia popped up from behind the front desk, shocking his dear dragon friends. The store had been rather quiet, and they had just assumed it was due to the lack of customers. As it turned out, the quiet was due to Wes' disappearance. And now the only question which remained was the issue of what he was doing behind the desk.

Deciding to ignore the strangeness of Wes' appearance, Grandina moved on to much more important things. She was busy restocking and the fact that the best friends were traveling together wasn't shocking to her in the slightest. "Of course those two would be coming here together."

"I would expect nothing else from either of them." Igneel chimed in with his own two cents. It was common knowledge in the dragon community that before his death, Talorikai and Dyzekaj were almost inseparable. We say almost due to the fact that they went like a decade without speaking to each other, a decade which was the result of a feud over the best type of tea. Of course the men had made up later though and everything had gone back to normal for dragons everywhere.

"Did you all just mention Talorikai?" Acnologia, while having been a part of Crime Sorciere for a while now, didn't feel comfortable in the other guild members' presence. Perhaps it was due to the fact that he had actually been planning on exterminating the human race which made him so uncomfortable around them. He instead spent a great deal of time in the front, sniffing pickles while the shop was closed.

"The water dragon, yes." Metalicana nodded his head to assure the dragonslayer before going back to his work. He had been building a new shelf to fit their newest product which would be arriving in shipments in a few days.

Acnologia's eyes widened when he heard the news confirmed. You see, he was rather old as far as humans were concerned and was well acquainted with many of the dragons. Talorikai, however, was a special case. He was also the one dragon Acnologia could describe by name that he had killed in the past. "Frick!"

"Acnologia, calm yourself down!" Weisslogia was subjected to a kick to the face as the man in question leaped over the front desk. Yes, Talorikai was a dragon and would be able to smell him out, but the desk just made him feel safer. It was another layer separating him from the water dragon.

"Yeah, why are you hiding like Jellal does when Erza comes in here?" Igneel looked extremely confused by the development. Jellal and Mystogan were the only ones who had ever jumped over the desk, and Erza had been the reason every single time. That was of course based off of an awkwardness stemming from romantic feelings. Acnologia most certainly did not have those for Talorikai, so what was going on?

"Oh my Zeref!" Grandina had apparently realized what was happening. She stared in shock at the cowering water dragonslayer.

* * *

The doors to the shop were thrown open in haste. (Will these poor doors ever catch a break?) In waltzed two figures, one bouncing almost excitedly."I SMELL MY SO-ON!"

"Oh, that's what he meant." Everyone finally seemed to reach the same page that Grandina was on. Acnologia was Talorikai's son. How had they forgotten that?

"Kai, just check behind the counter." Igneel pointed in the general direction of said counter, turning to face the shelves. If they were going to have guests, it would be best to have some sort of snack food out. The only issue was choosing a jar…

"He's been back there for a few hours." Grandina joined Igneel at the shelf, grabbing a jar and turning it over to read the label. It would be best to make sure the pickles they chose wouldn't do anything to the others. The last thing they needed was to accidentally eat some youth pickles and turn into toddlers or something. Now that would just be horrible!

"Uh huh, hid as soon as he heard your name mentioned." Metalicana joined the other two at the shelves. He had wanted to try something from one of the jars for a long while now, but had never actually pulled one off the shelf before. Perhaps today could be the day.

"That sounds exactly like my little Accie!" Talorikai was bursting with excitement. He had dearly missed his son in the years leading up to and after his death. And yes, that was completely possible.

"Frick." The dragonslayer slowly rose up from behind the counter. He now realized there was no escaping his father. The damage had been done as soon as his dad had honed in on his scent. Nothing in his life ever went right, so why did he even try to hold on to hope?

"Aren't you going to tell your dear old dad hello?" The water dragon looked on expectantly at his son. And yes, a greeting was completely necessary after the time they had spent apart. Besides, it was common courtesy to say hello to someone you killed after they were resurrected.

Acnologia sighed once. "Hello Father." The greeting was lacking in warmth-a fact none were too surprised about- as well as quiet and jumbled.

"Now son, I did not raise you to mumble!" Talorikai called his son to attention. He had raised his boy right (minus the murder thing), and this mumbling was not proper.

"Sorry, Sir!" Acnologia reacted instantly, apologizing with a passion. The other dragons could only watch in concern and slight amusement. Their children had never been this frightened of them, so it was different to see a child react in such a way. And well, the amusement stemmed from the fact that they had once been frightened of Acnologia, but now he was standing in their shop petrified of his very own father.

Sensing his son's discomfort but not caring in the slightest, Talorikai turned his gaze back to the young man. Instead of looking angry or something along the same lines, the man just looked confused and concerned. "Now why do you seem so scared to see me? I wasn't ever all that strict with you."

"I killed you." It was said in a very deadpan tone. Acnologia certainly wasn't dancing around the truth now was he.

"And again, I did not raise you to act that way!" Talorikai sighed deeply before getting one of those intense disappointed dad looks. (You know which ones I'm talking about, you've probably gotten one from someone before.) The despair on the man's face was heartbreaking, and it was as if he was rethinking every parenting decision he had made.

"You trained me in the art of slaying dragons." Once again, the tone was lacking warmth. It seemed as though straight up truth was all they were going to be getting out of Acnologia today.

"So that you wouldn't do those things, duh!" Instead of his dad face growing even deeper, the man gained a bit of a smile. While still exasperated, he seemed extremely amused by his son's misunderstanding of the reason he had taught him the skills he had.

"That's extremely twisted." Acnologia sputtered a bit before responding to his father. The other dragons (minus Skiadrum) nodded in agreement. You really shouldn't teach a kid how to do something just so they won't do it.

"Yes, well this whole family is rather twisted as you've proven to everyone." Talorikai sighed once again as his barely there smile wa replaced with the dad look. He was clearly having flashbacks to the Great Dragon War. Gosh, Acnologia had been such a disappointment then. Changing topic to something happier, the smile came back. "I hear you've joined a guild."

"Our guild master is a high class criminal. He infiltrated the Wizard Saints and nearly destroyed all of Fiore because he went power hungry." He had heard the proud tone in his father's voice upon speaking of the guild. But that certainly wouldn't do. Acnologia had messed up big time, and didn't deserve his father's happiness in the slightest.

"Sounds like a clever fellow." Knowing exactly what his son was trying to do, Talorikai smirked. He wasn't going to let his boy void his pride unless something really bad came out of the whole guild conversation.

"My other guild mates consist of five former Oracion Seis who tried to unlock maximum power sources. Oh and then there's the two who attempted to resurrect Zeref and ended up breaking the guild master out of prison. So yeah, a rather nice group of people." And so the deadpan tone returned! The dragon slayer was showing no emotion, only letting the quiet words slip out.

"Obviously you've joined this guild to better yourself, and I did raise you to do that!" And once again, Talorikai refused to play that game with his kid. His little Accie was bettering himself and he knew it. Now he just had to realize that he couldn't hide this from his dad. The slayer began to turn red, out of anger or embarrassment Talorikai was not sure. "Oh, am I embarrassing you in front of your girlfriend?"

"Dad, no!" The color drained from the boy's face as his father let that slip out. This 'girlfriend' was actually someone he did not want his father to meet. And as for the term girlfriend, well that was simply not accurate at this time.

"How'd you get him to call you dad!?" While this conversation had nothing to do with her, and she knew she had no right to interrupt, Skiadrum just could not contain herself. She had always wanted Rogue to call her Mom, but that had never happened. But apparently Talorikai over here had managed to get his son to sue such familiarity. She had to know how right now!

* * *

Later when everything had settled down, the store had closed, and Acnologia had gone off on some adventure with his guild, the dragons convened in the main room to talk. Dyzekaj started the conversation, knowing exactly what was on the others' minds. "You're probably wondering about all of those who were dead, right?"

"Of course we are. Avvie and Rai stopped by a few days ago to update us on all of you. Having troubles adjusting to breathing and human limbs, now are you?" Skiadrum was their chosen spokesperson of the evening, it seemed. The others could only nod and stare in agreement, waiting for an update.

"Well the other are for sure. I spent quite a great deal of time in human form while I was alive. As a tea enthusiast I had to. The others, well they've never really changed before." Talorikai sighed dreamily while thinking of tea. Oh how he had loved the beverage enough to change and drink it every chance he got.

"And on top of that they have to re-teach themselves how to fly. It's strange having wings after so many years of nothing." Dyzekaj backed up his friends talk with his own. The other resurrected dragons had been struggling to fly, something which amused him greatly. Thankfully his death had been more recent than the others, so he hadn't been as out of practice.

"And it's all your son's fault!" The shopkeepers couldn't understand why Talorikai was still smiling, but he was. Reminding him of the atrocious crimes his son had committed surely would fix that.

"Exactly!" It didn't.

* * *

Skiadrum entered the front of the store with a very serious expression on her face. In her arms was a clipboard, stacked with various documents. Clearing her throat to catch everyone's attention, the woman spoke. "With the influx of dragons that is sure to be coming in, I've decided we should take part of our profits and build an apartment complex. Dragons will be allowed to live within the complex but will be required to pay rent to us. Any objections?"

Igneel raised his hand and was called on shortly. Skiadrum had chosen him to speak first due to the concerned face he had been wearing. "How do you expect for them all to pay rent? And where would these buildings be located?"

"On the other side of Magnolia. We can't have them built too close or that'll be suspicious. No, instead we're going to build them a safe distance away." The shadow dragon was relieved this was something she had already thought through. If she had not already declared necessity for a distant building, someone may have suggested it be built right next to the shop, something which simply wouldn't do.

"But about the rent…" The fire dragon trailed off. The whole idea of dragons needing money might not have been a good one. They may just start mugging humans, and that was the very last thing any of them needed.

"Igneel, calm down. They can get jobs." Grandina was sent to comfort the fire dragon who had crawled himself into a corner after thinking of all of those muggings. She was the only one who had a calming enough voice to get Igneel to stop freaking out.

"Yes, Zek and I can open our very own exclusive tea shop." Talorikai casually suggested the new establishment. Dyzekaj nodded along, the earth dragon knowing that a tea shop was one of the best ideas they had ever had. After all, who better to make tea than tea enthusiasts?

"And how exactly do you expect to get the funds for this?" Weisslogia awaited an answer patiently. The two dragons had no human currency at the moment and would not be able to borrow some from the shop. Skiadrum was much too careful with their money to invest in a tea shop which could fail miserably.

"How did you get the funds for this place?" Zek raised an eyebrow at the five. He knew what they probably had to do to get money, but wanted to hear an admission.

The shadow dragon said nothing, not wanting the new arrivals. It was the other four dragons who spoke up. "Skiadrum."

Offended by the looks she then received from Talorikai and Dyzekaj, Skiadrum went to defend herself. "Hey, I can promise I used completely illegal means to do so. Shit, I meant legal means. Yeah, completely legal."

"Then Kai and I can surely use these same 'legal' means to fund the opening of our store." The air quotes around legal crossed a line in Skiadrum's mind. It was as if they were actively insulting her. Of course that had not been the intention, but she was ready to knock some heads around.

"Oh my God."

* * *

In a surprising turn of events, it was not the front door which flew open this time. No, it was instead the closet door. The flinging was a welcome change, but shocking nonetheless. But the fact that it was the closet revealed one lovely thing, their new customers were most certainly from Edolas.

"THE EDOLAS BUS IS IN THE HOUSE!" Mystogan really had been spending a great deal of time in Fiore as of late. As a result he had started to act rather strange when in town, having grown comfortable with the shop owners. And as long as the Edolas guests said nothing about the owners being dragons, all was well.

"Could you just shut up!?" An angry looking red head glared at the king. There was no need to announce their presence in such a… well she had no words to describe the way he had announced himself.

"HE IS YOUR KING, ERZA KNIGHTWALKER!" Lahar, this one Earthland Lahar (seeing as how he burned his Edolas counterpart at the stake for not supporting Jellal as king), glared at the woman. She was extremely disrespectful, and if she wasn't careful, would be joining his Edolas self soon enough.

"Sorry my lord." The red head bowed to the bluenette, apologizing profusely. No one was too sure over whether or not she was actually regretting her yelling or if she maybe feared Lahar a bit. Neither option sounded much like the woman, meaning no one would ever know.

"It's all good. Lahar, you don't have to be so hard on her. I'm a cool king." Mystogan laughed lightheartedly. Lahar was always jumping on people to show him respect, but he honestly didn't care much. If his subjects hated him, then so be it. As long as no one was assassinating him all would be well.

"Even still, it is disrespect." Lahar would not argue with his king. But he still had to at least make a comment about the behavior of his guard.

"She didn't question my authority so I see no reason to freak out." Mystogan knew when someone was questioning his position of power, and Knightwalker certainly hadn't been. Now he himself on the other hand… well that was a story for another day.

"I see your point, My King." The bespectacled man could not argue with Mystogan. If an argument ensued, then Lahar would have to burn himself at the stake (his real, Earthland, self) for daring participate in treason.

Knightwalker looked around at the different merchandise. Suddenly the random pickle jars in the castle made sense to her. "Oh so this is where you spend you days when you should be doing paperwork."

"Pft. Paperwork. That's what I have Lahar for!" The bluenette scoffed at the notion. Paperwork was both boring and pointless. It was one of the worst things about being king, hence the reason he had readily hired this (according to his Earthland self) stalker.

"Indeed, Miss Knightwalker." Lahar nodded in agreement with the man, just like always. There were very few times he did not jump to agree with the king, but this time was not one of those rare ones, something which angered the woman a bit.

"But you're the king!" She sputtered. What kind of king didn't do his own- well nevermind. Most kings didn't actually do any work, but that didn't mean he should be excused!

"I'm also hot stuff in his twenties so…" Mystogan shrugged. He knew he wasn't your everyday average king, but he wasn't a normal everyday adult either. In his mind, that meant he could do what he wanted and people would just have to deal. And well, he was the king so they really did just have to deal with it- either that or face execution by Lahar.

"Who decided making you king was a good idea?" Erza Knightwalker was still trying to wrap her head around the fact that this was her king. Yes, he ruled well, but off the throne the man was insufferable. There was just something about him, perhaps his air of nonchalance, that irked her greatly.

The bluenette pondered the inquiry for a moment before answering. "Hmm, ancestry? Oh, and Pantherlily."

* * *

It had been a stressful day of work for the dragons. They had gotten in new shipments of products, and had been forced to carry everything inside and sort it. On top of this grueling labor, there had been a huge influx of customers around lunchtime. The bottom line was, everyone was worn down, tired, and irritable.

"So I realized something today." Igneel was quiet as he spoke. It sounded as though the man had found some sort of enlightenment, prompting the others to be interested. Igneel had never sounded so peaceful before.

"And that would be?" Grandina only spoke seeing as how Igneel had waited a few minutes to continue speaking. He was being ridiculous, pausing in the middle of a story.

The fire dragon went to lay down in the middle of the shop floor. He then proceeded to sigh deeply before continuing his speech. "Gildarts is a potato farmer in Edolas."

"Yes, and...?" Weisslogia waited for some sort of answer. The fire dragon just shrugged, not really knowing how this fact could be more significant. He was a potato farmer, and that was that.

"His love for potatoes pierces through the forces separating both worlds." Metalicana supplied some form of an explanation for his sleepy friend. The iron dragon slayer was just joking, but realized it seemed to be true and continued. "In other words, he loves potatoes so much that there could never be a version of him in existence who dislikes them in any way."

"Holy frick. That's some deep stuff right there." Igneel sat up slightly before falling back over. He hadn't slept the night before and was a wreck as a result. Perhaps that midnight ice cream hadn't been a good idea.

"We're talking about potatoes, Igneel." Skiadrum stared at the dragon. Sure, he hadn't slept the night before, but sleep deprivation did not make someone act as he was. Of course Igneel was a bit of an idiot to begin with anyway but...

Abruptly, Igneel began glaring at she who was speaking. "Shh. You're ruining the moment."

* * *

A slightly frazzled Evergreen followed by a slightly less than frazzled Bixlow entered the guild hall later that evening, searching for something. No one was all that sure what until the woman approached a random table. "Has anyone seen Freed recently? The last time I heard from him was a while ago."

One of the table's female inhabitants seemed to consider this for a moment. "Last time I checked Gildarts was chasing him around about something."

"Oh then he's probably fine." Bixlow wrote it off as Freed just wanting a break from the craziness that was the Thunder Legion. He too needed a break every once in awhile.

"And on a completely random note, have you seen the princess's new haircut?" The girl attempted to start some sort of gossip talk with Evergreen. Yes, it was a rather sad attempt, but it was an attempt nonetheless.

Evergreen wasn't planning on talking to this girl longer than necessary though, so her friend was forced to jump in and keep things from getting awkward. "Yeah, it looks really nice. I mean she's working it."

"Definitely." The first girl nodded animatedly.

* * *

Cana Alberona had left her home for the guild this day in no hurry. There was nothing strange going on, and she wasn't planning on taking any jobs for awhile. She was just hoping to sit in the guild hall surrounded by her family. But on her way, she had gotten many strange looks from random people in Magnolia. Completely confused as to why this was, she finished her walk to the guild hall.

Proceeding on through the doors, she was met with a most shocking sight. There, on the missions board was a humongous banner. It announced the creation of various holidays. One stuck out more than the others, speaking of a National Cana Week.

The girl could only stare in horror. "Oh my God."

"Cana, I completely understand," Romeo Conbolt said as he approached tentatively. He was one to go comfort his guildmates when need be. He was also their problem-solver as Makarov explained things. If something was going wrong, Romeo was expected to fx it all thanks to the Juvia incident weeks back. Not that he wouldn't have tried to patch things up before hand, it was just that the expectation was now there.

"Romeo, there is now an official holiday referred to as Cana Week. I fail to see how you can relate to this." The girl sighed deeply. She could not accept him sympathy in this moment. Perhaps if Romeo had said something different when beginning his comforting speech. But now she just could not deal with the fact that he was attempting to empathize with her over something he simply just had not experienced. The embarrassment of having a holiday in your honor was strong.

"Read the rest of the announcement. Romeo Day is a thing now too." Romeo heartfelt sigh was even deeper than Cana's before him. He had honestly tried to keep up a positive attitude about the whole thing. I mean how many kids out there could say they had a holiday in their honor? But it was honestly just more embarrassing than exciting.

"Maybe it's not us." The brunette was grasping at straws and they both knew it. There was no way that these holidays weren't the work of their fathers. Cana knew Gildarts had gone on to try and appeal to the king about Cana Week in the past, but had never been successful. Apparently things were changing.

Deciding it was best to cover up his frustration with sarcasm, Romeo countered her desperate reach for liberation. "Yeah that's exactly why the announcement says in thanks to the service of the Wizards of Fairy Tail Fiore would like to inform you…"

"What have our fathers done?" It was time to throw in the towel. Gildarts and Macao were most definitely responsible. There was no other explanation for the issue, meaning no use in fighting the facts. It was time to face the harsh reality that their fathers, while having good intentions, had screwed them over.

"Ruined us, Cana. Ruined us."

-O-

While the kids were sulking, the adults were speaking. All three fathers looked upset with the result of their crazy adventure and treasonous acts. "I would have thought Cana would be overjoyed!"

"Yeah, Romeo too!" Macao was just as upset as Gildarts was. He had worked so hard to make Romeo love him but to no avail.

"Perhaps we should have asked them first." Gildarts did not regret getting his daughter a holiday, but he did know it could have gone over better. If they had maybe warned the kids things wouldn't be as bad as they were.

"Yeah. So should we go ahead and put Alzack in Aracadios' position before someone finds out?" Completely ignoring what Gildarts said, Wakaba made the suggestion. The men had already discussed letting Al in on the plan, but had decided against it in their initial plot. But Arcadios was getting suspicious of Hisui's new haircut so they had to do something.

"It's time." The three all nodded, ready to do what needed to be done.

-O-

"Cana are you serious about this?" The brunette in question had lured Romeo into a dark corner of the guildhall as soon as everyone had calmed a bit about the whole holiday thing. The corner was secluded, meaning no ones would stare weirdly at her because of the holidays mentioned before. Romeo had followed because he figured she knew how to hide away, but now she was suggesting something which made him unsure and confused.

"Yes Romeo, I am completely serious." Cana's gaze was sure. She had no doubt that what she was suggesting was a good idea. It would be best for Romeo to accept this.

"Does it actually relieve stress and pent up emotions." The boy was still unsure of the whole thing. Although he truly did want to reduce his stress level, which had increased due to anxiety over Romeo Day, his friend's idea seemed rather ludicrous.

"Yeah, but you can't tell anyone I gave this to you." The brunette calmly nodded before her gaze turned threatening. This was a secret she was sharing with the kid, and most definitely not something others needed to know about.

"Believe me, I wasn't planning on it." Romeo honestly wished he could go and forget this whole day, meaning the very last thing he would do was speak of it unnecessarily. Plus he was someone who respected secrets so there was no way he was spilling the beans about this whole thing.

"So, are you going to try it?" Cautiously looking at Romeo, Cana encouraged him to move forward with her suggestion. This whole thing would be much more bearable once he finally gave in and went for it. Honestly his hesitancy was bothering her.

"I don't want to deplete your stash. Besides, isn't alcohol the thing that's supposed to loosen you up, not pickle juice?" Okay, so he finally said what he had been thinking the whole entire time. Pickle juice wasn't something normal people engaged in drinking normally, but then again, Fairy Tail was full of unusual people. Romeo soon realized that everyone in this guild probably engaged in weird habits like this.

"Romeo, in the face of addiction nothing's for certain." This little piece of advice was actually a great truth. It shocked Romeo immensely to hear Cana say something so... insightful? He had never even considered she could come up with such a thing. And he meant that in the nicest way he could.

"So you're addicted to pickle juice now instead of being an alcoholic." Sighing, Romeo explained his assumptions. It counded strange, no matter who said it. How did one enjoy drinking pickle juice so much that it became an addiction?

"Of course. But I disguise this addiction under the guise of being an alcoholic." The woman confirmed Romeo's assessment. She had decided there was no reason to hide how messed up her life was from someone like him. Romeo may have been slightly bitter, but he was full of hope and acceptance.

"Cana it makes no sense." Well maybe not. Or perhaps he just accepted people as they were, not the strange realities of , that made much more sense.

"Romeo just drink the damn juice and simmer with me." And simmer they did.

-O-

Somewhere, possibly in the sky, maybe on a boat or something, were two new dragons. The two could be considered something akin to opposites, with one being an ice dragon and the other a member of the flame kingdom. The two had not been friends before their untimely deaths, and really weren't anything close to friends after traveling together for so long. In fact, they were still questioning why they had decided to travel together to begin with.

"How in all the dragons of Fiore, did I end up stuck with you?" The fire dragon, otherwise known as Atlas Flame, could not help but ask the question. His companion had been getting on his very last nerve for days now.

"Well I was hoping to head in the same direction as Raiolyn and Avvelenare left." Kaneqkorah was not one to just let the question hang in the air. But Atlas Flame really should have guessed what her response would be seeing as how the woman had some kind of weird obsession with Rai.

Sighing deeply, Atlas Flame offered a solution for their predicament (they were going to the same place you see). "Okay, but we're parting ways as soon as we get to the shop, deal?"

"Why of course. While you Atlas Flame are much more tolerable than the others, I would not wish to spend more time with you than necessary." The ice dragon nodded along with his suggestion. She did not wish to spend more time than necessary with the man.

"Thanks, I think."

-O-

Meanwhile in the shop, Grandina was doing what she did best- snooping. "Dyzekaj, who is in this picture I conveniently found next to your wallet because I would never rummage through it."

"Yeah, we thought you didn't have any kids!" Igneel jumped in with his two cents. Zek had always been a lonely man before his death, and he had most certainly not been resurrected long enough to successfully 'find' a child. There was simply no way he had a son of his own.

Glancing up shortly to see the object in question, Dyzekaj explained the circumstances surrounding the photo. "I don't. That's my nephew."

"He looks human." Metalicana had not said this to be offensive. The picture was definitely of a human, it just could have been a dragon's human form. The iron dragon was just almost positive that the child was most certainly not a dragon.

"Does that mean your brother kidnapped a baby!?" Skiadrum leaped into the conversation full of enthusiasm. It was almost as if the idea of kidnapping a child had excited her in some strange way. Perhaps she had more issues than she let on…

"Yeah, no. My brother went out and had a kid with a human woman. The result is that little dragonslayer baby in the photo." Laughing slightly the earth dragon offered an appropriate explanation. He really couldn't have anyone thinking he was a criminal.

"Oh cool. But I thought your brother tried to disown you a few centuries back."

"He did. But I mean he has no idea I'm alive now so I can go kidnap my nephew whenever I want." Talorikai snorted in the background at what his friend just said. The other dragons all had various reactions. Skiadrum, Metalicana, and Igneel all seemed to accept this as being normal. Weisslogia looked mildly concerned, and well Grandina…

"True, true. But maybe you should uh.. tell him you're alive or something." The sky dragon wasn't sure to react to this whole situation. Kidnapping a child, no matter if he was returned or was related to you, was rather messed up.

He seemed to consider this for a moment. "Nah."

-O-

"So based upon our conversation with Zek earlier, I'm now wondering where the hell you all got your children from."

"We all found our children abandoned, I'm sure."

"Is that how you got Wendy?!"

"Yes. Her mother was a very young woman who was in no position to be taking care of a child. There are mentions of guardian wood spirits in her village of origin, so that explains why she was left in the woods. Honestly, why do you all look so sick all of a sudden?"

"That is most certainly not how we got our children, that's why!"

"Yeah, my Acnologia's parents were trying to drown him on account of the fact that his twin was a stillborn. You know how some of these towns can be, believing in demon children and such."

"Igneel you've got some explaining to do about how you acquired your son!"

"Hey, it's not that bad! I may or may not have grabbed him in the dead of night in order to kill him. I mean, I obviously changed my mind the second he yawned. Gosh, Natsu was such an adorable little kid…"

"Well that settles it then, some of you did resort to kidnappings!"

"Okay, okay. Mine didn't actually count as kidnapping. I mean, it was more of a revenge story. Like this one blacksmith kept stealing all my metal reserves so I stole his son."

"Oh my god."

"Yeah, and his wife had died so it left him completely alone. Oh, and then I accidentally hit him on the head with a metal pipe when I was stealing his kid so he died. So technically I rescued an orphan!"

"That's.. That is not at all how this whole thing works."

"And what about the rest of you?"

"Yeah, how'd you two end up with kids?"

"Ask Skiadrum. I woke up with a baby in my cave and a note saying to thank her later."

"Before I start just let me say that I was unaware Grandina already had a child or I wouldn't have swiped one for Weisslogia."

"What did you do!?" The other female could only wait for an answer. She was terrified of the response, but wished to hear it either way.

"Okay, I was jealous because you all had kids already and it was peaceful after the dragon war so I wanted one. But as far as I knew Igneel's kid was a few years older than I wanted, and Metalicana's kid was even ancient in comparison to Igneel's. Then there was Acnologia who was super ancient in comparison. So I picked out Rogue because he was a cute baby, but I wanted him to have some friend his age to play with. Hence the reason I grabbed a kid for Wes as well. I gave him the blonde one because it was closest to white. And that's pretty much all there is to the story." Skiadrum narrated the tale without caring too much about the others' opinions. The whole event was in the past, so there was nothing that could change it now.

"So you kidnapped two children? Cuz that's actually worse than what Metalicana- wait no, he murdered someone. Nevermind." Grandina was still being rather judgmental, but hey, it was actually justified. Kidnapping and murder weren't okay, even if you got a kid out of it. Didn't these people have morals?

"I did in fact kidnap two very small humans." Skiadrum didn't see why she should hide it. Yes, she had participated in a kidnapping. There really wasn't anything she could say to change that fact, not that she really cared to in all honesty.

"Damn girl." Metalicana stared at Skiadrum with a new sense of respect. Igneel too, had a similar expression.

"No wonder you guys ended up getting the money for this shop illegally!"

-O-

""I SMELL DISCOUNTS!" Weisslogia used his signature move once more, popping up from behind the counter. Thank the lord everyone had come to expect it now.

"Wes, please shut up." Skiadrum sighed at her old friend. He was just so… loud? Well whatever it was he was, sometimes made her question why she spent so much time around the man.

"Fine. All I'm saying is there are two.. no, three, customers with white hair approaching." Wes had rolled his eyes at the woman before sniffing the air. And yes, he was able to actually smell the color white.

"You got all that from one sniff?" Skiadrum seemed skeptical, and rightly so. It was not normal to smell a color, let alone smell said color while surrounded by so many pickles. The food was known for throwing off a dragon's sense of smell after all.

"You think I'm weird!" Skiadrum did not deny it.

-O-

Within DSPS, all was quite quiet. Igneel, Grandina, and Metalicana had all gone off to get lunch together, leaving Skiadrum and Weisslogia behind. And then of course Wes proceeded to leave to do his own clothing shopping. He had wanted to find some new white shirts. Anyway, Skiadrum was left alone, except for Crime Sorciere, seeing as how those guys never really left the backroom for long.

And of course Cobra was still sitting in the backroom while the others had gone on a mission without him. You see, he had needed rest due to their previous mission. Erik had been exposed to some amazingly loud sounds which had only been amplified by his sense of hearing.

So yeah, the guy needed some rest. And he was getting some too. Or at least he was until Skiadrum entered the backroom, subjecting him to her thoughts. "OH MY GOD, GET AWAY FROM ME!"

"Erik this is my shop!" Offended, the woman had turned to him with a glare. He was rather messed up if he thought he could boss her around on her turf. No sir, she did not play like that.

"Yeah but this is my person and your head is messed up, woman!" Normally he would not have had the issue when the shadow dragon was near. Of course at the moment they were the only two in the shop, meaning there were no other thoughts to drown out Skiadrum's.

"What the heck are you going on about now?" For some reason the woman just did not get it right away. She looked extremely confused, and maintained her mildly offended appearance. He had some explaining to do, it seemed.

Sighing quietly, but still looking at least a little terrified, he went on to outline what was going on, all the while her thoughts continuing to poison his mind. "Enhanced hearing. Reading everyone's thoughts unintentionally. Does any of this ring a bell?"

"OH MY GOD, I AM SO SORRY!" The reaction was immediate. Skiadrum understood that her mind was a rather dark place. Sometimes even she feared what was going on in there. And this poor mortal had just been sentenced to hear it all. So perhaps she should just give him some space and uh… take a lunch break?

-O-

"Happy are you sure you're okay?" Natsu and Lucy were currently huddled around Happy who had been sulking in a corner of the guildhall for nearly an hour. The little blue cat looked so depressed that it had even started to concern people next door who could feel his bitterness seeping into the neighboring buildings.

"I'm fine, Natsu. Perfectly fine." A very bitter expression played against the cat's features. Happy most certainly was not okay, and they both knew it.

"You're mutilating a fish. And you're not even eating it."Lucy tried this time to get him to explain what was going on. And the part about the fish was very true indeed. Happy had been furiously ripping at a fish for the past twenty minutes, never once attempting to eat the thing.

"Well maybe if someone could just get their act together then I wouldn't be like this!" In a sudden outburst, Happy found himself full of rage and frustration. There was a reason he was so sad today, and the happy mood of the guildhall was not helping with it at all, only making Happy's bitterness worsen.

"Lucy, get your act together!" Natsu was quick to whip around and face his best friend. He was most definitely not the cause of Happy's irritation, making Lucy the only logical (!Natsu's using logic!) one. It made sense too, those two had never had the best relationship.

"Why do you immediately assume it's me!? Maybe you're the one who needs to get their act together." Lucy now turned on her companion. There was no need for him to blame her for everything when it could very well be his own fault. Besides, Happy would have made it pretty darn clear if she were the one messing things up.

"You know what, no. Two people need to get their act together before I go crazy!" Seeing the argument that was about to ensue, Happy sighed deeply. He should have known those two were going to end up arguing about whatever he said to them. So why did he even try to try?

"Happy what are you even talking about?" Lucy looked back at the cat who seemed to have deflated a bit. Perhaps yelling in front of him was not the best move on her and Natsu's parts. It probably just upset him even more than before.

"Yeah tell us who it is so we can go make them get their acts together!" Backing Lucy up the pinkette seemed to be back to his joyful ways. He was totally ready to force whoever was making his friend so sad into 'getting it together' as Happy had said. There really was no need for the cat to be sad, he would make sure of it.

Sighing deeply, Happy stood up once more to respond. He seemed to be hit with a burst of inspiration though because he was back to the fiery glares and frustration. "At this point I feel like even Erza and Jellal have their act together more than you to ever will! And he won't even let her know he lives in that pickle shop now!"

"JELLAL LIVES IN THE PICKLE SHOP!?" Erza, while wanting to respect what was going on in the corner, could not help but hear that last comment. Thankfully Bisca was leading her away to have girl talk before anything too crazy could happen to Happy for keeping this secret from her for so long. You see, the cat was much more observant than anyone would ever give him credit for.

"Huh?" Natsu and Lucy just looked at Happy confused. Jellal and Erza had absolutely nothing to do with this so why had they been brought up? And why in the seven levels of hell was Happy so frustrated with them?

"I WISH I HAD LILY'S LIFE!"

A chorus of loud and dramatic gasps filled the guildhall.

-O-

In a corner of the guildhall sat four men, all fathers. At the moment, three were surrounding the other and speaking in hushed tones. "Why would I help you overthrow the king!? That's treason!" Al looked absolutely scandalized.

"Yeah, but it's not treason now." The three men each raised an eyebrow at Alzack. It appeared as though they were waiting for him to challenge their proclamation.

"What are you talking about?" That same scandalized expression appeared once more. This conversation was getting a little too wild for comfort.

"The new makeovers. Haven't you thought it strange that Princess Hisui has those weird lightning bolt shaped fly-away hairs now?" Gildarts mocked said 'lightning bolts' with his fingers. It was a humorous display, but Al'z mind was on other things at the moment.

"Now that you mention it, that is pretty weird." The thought seemed to take a bit of time to process before he spoke once more. "And I mean Makarov has been missing a lot recently." Alzack continued down the same train of thought as earlier. That train had begun heading to a rather dangerous destination, however.

"The point we're trying to make here is that there's a reason Cana Week and Romeo Day exist." Macao sighed as he said this. Al was a smart kid and really should have pieced everything together by now.

"Please tell me you did not overthrow the king!" The cowboy was shocked beyond all comprehension. These guys had actually gone ahead and put their guildmaster on the throne which rose the question of what happened to the real king. "Fine. I'll help you."

"Cool. We'll get you an Asuka Week!" Gildarts was overjoyed to reward their new accomplice with such a thing.

-O-

And now we visit some random gossipy girls. Maybe they were wizards, but these authors really don't care. All we know is that they like to talk about the latest news. "Okay, I used to be like totally in love with Princess Hisui's makeover, but now there's something better out there!"

"Yeah, I thought that nothing would be able to top that girl's new look but just look." Her friend nodded along. Princess Hisui's haircut had been all the rage, everyone thinking it transformed her.

"I had no idea anyone could make such a drastic change in a short time." Another one of the girls sighed dreamily. She only wished she could go through such an intense makeover without it looking like she had plastic surgery.

"Arcadios looks like he could win Fiore's Next Top Model if he tried out!" Because yes, the girls just loved watching that show on their lacrima television sets.

-O-

When the doors to the shop were opened to reveal two new visiting dragons, Igneel had been the only one in the front room. He nodded at the one on the left. "Atlas Flame."

"Igneel." The dragon responded with a similar nod of acknowledgement. A small smile from each male to the other was exchanged. "It is good to see you old friend. So how often does your son stop by?"

Smiling brightly, Igneel responded. "Eh, every once in awhile. Maybe once every other week." He then smiled up at the sky, reminiscing about those visits.

"How have you managed to keep your identities so secret?" Sure, Igneel hadn't said anything about hiding his identity, but Avvie and Rai had filled all of the dragons in on what was going on. The had thought it the best way to make sure everyone was careful.

"Fake names. Bad ones at that, but still fake." Igneel snorted, remembering the quick thinking they had all had to endure in those first few days. Sure, it hadn't been necessary to introduce themselves to customers, but it hadn't hurt.

"And yours would be?" The newly revived dragon thought the idea a good one. If they had wished to hide their identities changing names was the best route to go. Knowing Igneel, however, his name was ridiculous.

"Iggy Neal." The man smiled brightly once more. Although it was rather idiotic, he was proud of his fake name. It was almost as good as- better make sure Metalicana hadn't miraculously acquired mind reading skills- Mal Tal.

Atlas Flame snorted. He then stared incredulously at his friend. "And you're the king of fire dragons."

"Shoot. I forgot about that! They're probably confused as to why I never came back from my lunch break thirty years ago!"

"You left for lunch and never came back?" Atlas Flame stared at the other man in shock as Igneel nodded. "Time has clearly not changed you." Atlas Flame laughed quietly, Igneel joining in almost immediately. The situation was a rather hilarious one after all.

Igneel looked to be deep in thought. He was debating between sending a letter or just waiting to see if the former royal soldiers would come to hunt him down. "I should probably send a letter or something, shouldn't I?"

There was no hesitation. "Yes."

-O-

Returning to the guild hall, there was a sense of urgency flooding the mages. Natsu and Lucy was frantically running around in circles, trying to understand what they had done to upset happy. Suddenly, the pinkette stepped his pacing and looked to his best friend. "Our son just told us he wants different parents, what do we do!?"

"I don't know! Maybe we should talk to Laxus…" Lucy trailed off in thought. Laxus was certainly a possible source of help in this situation. Of course she would have to figure out where he was before she could get any help. .

"Why do we need to talk to him? He can't help us now, Luce." Natsu was completely flabbergasted by the mention of the other dragon slayer. They were talking about Happy, not storms or lightning rods. There was no need for Laxus to be mentioned in the slightest.

"He wishes he had different parents so I figured he could tell us what Happy is going through right now." Understanding his confusion, Lucy supplied the quick response. She was right about this too, Laxus absolutely hated his father. Perhaps the other man would be able to help them identify Happy's source of frustration.

"Smart call." Natsu nodded approvingly. Now that he knew what her thought process was, Lucy's suggestion made all the more sense. It was even starting to seem like a good idea.

"Wait, since when is Happy our son?" Realizing suddenly what they had been saying, Lucy froze. How had they each called Happy their child without knowing until now?

"We- I don't know. Do you think this was what he meant about getting our acts together?" The pinkette seemed lost for a moment. He hadn't known he was calling Happy his child until now. It was an awakening of sorts, realizing that he had been treating his friend like a small son for the past few months.

"No, he loves when we baby him." Considering what had just been discussed, Lucy came to this conclusion. She had been babying Happy even more than Natsu recently, and he had loved every moment of it. There was no way this was the part of their act they had to get together. But perhaps the cat wanted them to parent him more…?

"Aye." He had to concede.

* * *

Meanwhile in some small room in a random house in Fiore, our favorite Exceeds were meeting for tea. Carla sat elegantly on a chair, watching as Happy and Pantherlily discussed something which was apparently important.

"You did not!" Lily looked absolutely scandalized as he stared at Happy. What he had just heard the blue exceed say was shocking, but also intriguing. Of course Lily would never admit to anyone that he thrived on drama and gossip.

"I did. But it was an accident!" Happy blushed furiously. He hadn't meant to say what he did. He had just wanted his companions to realize they were being both ridiculous and oblivious. It really hadn't worked out that way at all. "But look at the situation I'm in. They love each other, but they don't know it!"

"I can understand your frustration. Look at my life, Happy! Gajeel admits things to me but not the person he needs to. And Levy talks to me about her feelings when we go to the library together every week but refuses to say anything. Why would you tell anyone you want my life?" Lily seemed to become more and more stressed out as he thought through everything he had to deal with. He had never realized how frustrating his life was until someone else had claimed to want it for their own.

"Dude at least they acknowledge their feelings!" The conversation paused as the final members of the Exceed party arrived. Frosch and Lector always did show up rather late after getting lost somewhere along the way.

* * *

"WE'RE BACK BABIES!" The quiet of the shop after closing was interrupted by the arrival of some very loud dragons. Avvie did love her big entrances.

"Isn't it supposed to be b-" Igneel looked confused, as if he hadn't fully realized Avvelenare was the one who had just spoken. If he had, he wouldn't have started to question her word choices.

Avvie was on Igneel within seconds. She wasn't too keen on having someone question her words, you see. "THIS IS A NO CURSING ZONE, GODDAMNIT!"

"Oh, sorry. Wait-" The fire dragon apologized quickly. Of course he realized just how messed up Avvie's words were a moment too late.

"NOPE! I am not dealing with you until I see my son!" Avvie refused to speak to anyone else until she saw Cobra. Sure, she hadn't raised him or anything, but she was able to brag about him now so there was no way she was giving him up.

"Not actually your kid." The dragon slayer made the announcement as he entered the front room. He sounded so uncaring. It was as if he had lost all care.

"There you are!" Avvie then proceeded to go through a series of questions about his well being. She needed to make sure Jellal was feeding Erik right, and that he wasn't getting up to anything bad. Of course there were also questions about dating but Cobra chose to just ignore those.

After a bit more conversation, and Cobra departing on some mission with his guild, Avvelenare turned to her blonde companion. "Now Rai are you done visiting yet?"

"Yeah. Laxus is so cold man." The man sighed deeply. Sure, he had gotten the kid to half agree to being his stand-in son, but things were still rough. Laxus hated almost everyone and everything. He was a far cry from Rai.

"Well my Erik is so disgruntled twenty-four seven. It's adorable!" Avvie sighed happily before skipping out of the shop, Rai following happily as always.

* * *

All was well in the shop, and Wes was missing as usual. Of course this time around the others suspected he was behind the counter once again. They were proven to be right moments later when he popped up once more. "I SMELL OLD PEOPLE!"

"That's just Ultear." Macbeth was in the front room this time around, having decided he was done napping for the day. His rude comments were bound to start coming sooner or later, and apparently he had chosen sooner.

"No, like I seriously smell old people." Weisslogia shook his head. He knew what Ultear smelled like, and sure, there was still a bit of old lady perfume mixed in her scent, but this was most certainly not the time mage.

"Riiight. Okay, that means new customers?" Igneel had yet to pick up on the smell himself, but trusted Weisslogia was speaking truth. Wes was known for having one of the greatest senses of smell out there among the dragons.

"Maybe they're here for those youth pickles." Metalicana's suggestion would be the first. He was sure there was no other reasons someone so old would be gracing their shop. A few of the others seemed to accept this explanation without thinking up any other possibility.

"Or the healing ones." Of course Grandina would come in with a counter-argument. Some old people did not wish to be young, just healthy. Perhaps whoever it was was really just hoping to fix up some sickness they had.

"Or maybe it's just Porlyusica who hates humans here to complain about how Grandina hasn't told Wendy who she is yet." A third voice came in with the suggestion.

Grandina turned around slowly. "Oh, hey Porlyusica."

The woman left the shop about ten minutes later. Grandina stood in the doorway watching her leave as Igneel spoke to her. "Damn, those glares could freeze the country."

The sky dragon nodded slowly. She was used to striking glares, but this one was just… wow. "It's even worse than Kory, and I didn't even think that was possible!"

* * *

It had been a normal day in the guild hall. No random holidays had arisen that morning, and all was well. It wasn't quiet because Fairy Tail could never be so. But the sense of peace of every member was not to be taken lightly. Of course this peace couldn't last forever, and when Gray saw a flash of silver hair, he knew his morning was not going to go as planned. "Lyon why are you here?"

"I'm just in town on a mission." The older mage shrugged lightly. He had just been in town and thought it couldn't hurt to stop by. He was friends with a few people in the guild, and no one ever actively objected to his presence other than Gray. Besides, that pickle shop down the street gave him a great discount so his time in Magnolia was not wasted.

"And you're at my guild because?"Gray raised an eyebrow at his brother's answer. Lyon wasn't one to pop in randomly like th- oh wait. He was definitely someone who popped in randomly. Nevermind then. The younger man now felt like an idiot for asking.

"I'm certainly not here to check up on you again." It was such a typical Lyon-answer. Gray certainly wasn't surprised by the harsh tone it was given in either. For some reason Lyon liked to remind Gray of his distaste for him whenever he could. Or so the younger man thought.

"Of course not. But you've been here every weekend for like three months now." Gray hadn't realized how true this was until he said it. Every saturday morning that same silver hair appeared in his field of vision and they had a ridiculous conversation. He never could get an appropriate explanation for his presence for Lyon those other times either…

"Well I most definitely did not purchase a house in Magnolia for the explicit purpose of staying in when I come to see you." Huffing slightly at the notion he had pulled out of thin air, Lyon stared Gray down to make sure his claim was understood. He simply could not have the younger mage thinking he actually cared.

"Yeah, why would you ever do that?" Gray looked at his companion pointedly. Lyon's imagination was always rather wild. Gray liked to hear the full stories he concocted in his crazy little head. Now he wasn't sure what reasoning Lyon would add to the tale this time, but it was sure to be rather entertaining.

"To cut down on hotel fees. Well that's why I would have done such a thing if you know, I actually cared enough to see you every week." The boy sweat a bit as he said this. He looked nervous and misplaced, words Gray never really could associate with Lyon.

It was disconcerting to say the very least. And although it made him sound like he did truly care, Gray couldn't help but ask if everything was alright. Of course it had to be done in a very Gray way though. "Lyon, you're acting weird."

Instead of supplying an appropriate response, Lyon strategically redirected the conversation. "So uh.. How's Juvia?"

* * *

"Okay so we may have figured out how to close the Edolas portal." Jellal and Mystogan had become even closer friends than before. The two were practically inseparable at this point. But while this was true, the two had still decided it would be best to figure out how to close the Edolas portal. It would be for the best due to some crazy Edolas citizens who would do anything for magic. Ridding the shop of the portal was the only way to make sure no crazy kidnappings happened again.

"Jellal, we've been over this before. There's no need to close the Edolas portal." Skiadrum was on them rather fast. The Edolas portal provided such great business opportunities and wasn't causing any harm to the building. She really had no idea why these boys thought it needed to be closed. Besides, closing the portal meant no more Mystogan and if she was telling the truth, Skiadrum had gotten rather attached to him.

"Are you sure you're sure?" Both bluenettes looked to the shadow dragon for an answer. They assumed (and rightfully so) that their combined stares would get her to dish out the truth about her feelings on the situation.

"Definitely." Skiadrum didn't really even take time to consider the alternative. All she could see here was the chance of a greater profit, and new customers. Besides, those from Edolas which had already been in the shop had been rather respectful. And as long as said customers went back to Edolas as soon as they were done shopping, no harm would be done. Mystogan was surely going to be keeping close watch of who went in and out of the portal anyway, so there truly was no need to worry.

"Okay because all Mystogan and I figured out was closing inter-dimensional portals, not this one. This is good." Jellal spilled the beans on what he and Mystogan had concluded earlier that day. The boys had been working hard at closing portals, but instead of opening one like said portal to Edolas, they instead found an entirely different dimension. And one where mages and wizards did not exist in the slightest at that. Those had been easy to close, but the same technique had not worked on the shop's portal when they had tried it without telling the dragons beforehand. It really looked like that portal was going to be around for a while longer.

"Meaning you still don't have any idea how to close the Edolas portal." The shadow dragon said so with no malice. She was simply just stating facts here. Even still, it seemed to make the man nervous for some reason.

"SCARLET HAIR ALERT! WE MUST GO ON LOCKDOWN!" Before anything else could be said, Jellal and Mystogan were behind the front counter once again. They hadn't even taken time to walk around to the entrance to the desk, instead leaping over the tabletop. A box filled with customer surveys was spilled in the process.

"Honestly you two." Skiadrum probably would have been more frustrated if she hadn't already gotten used to this sort of thing. Every time Erza came anywhere near DSPS, they were jumping around trying to hide themselves as if their lives depended on it, which in all honesty, they might.

* * *

Earlier that morning, the news on the guild board was updated once again. Apparently there was a new holiday now, one dubbed Asuka Week. The members of Fairy Tail had realized something fishy was going on, what with their members getting these new holidays and all. But they had chosen not to question it and continued living their lives as they always had. Well, except for Romeo and Cana that is. The two of them were still disgruntled.

"Yo Asuka, wanna join us?" The young girl had been casually walking through the guild hall when she was stopped over by the back corner. Romeo and Cana had made it their little hideaway in the weeks since their holidays were announced.

"I'm only five!" The girl was pretty darn sure they were offering her alcohol. And well, that wasn't legal yet at all no matter what age Cana had started drinking at. Besides, her mom would be really mad if she did join up.

"It's not alcohol, I promise!" Cana quickly went to settle the girl. She didn't need Asuka going around telling everyone she was offering alcoholic beverages to five year olds. She had never done so before, and did not plan on ever making such an offer. Although never in her questioning was the suggestion Asuka pick up a drink. No, she had only meant that the girl should come sit in their corner with them.

"Yeah, it's just pickle juice." Romeo was quick to back her up. He did realize that she wasn't actually planning on giving Asuka anything to drink to begin with, but she had claimed the drink wasn't an alcoholic one, so he thought it best to help with that aspect of the conversation first. Besides, if she did join them, they'd probably end up offering her something to drink eventually.

"Why are you both drinking it then? I've never seen Cana with anything other than booze." The young girl waited patiently for an answer. The way she saw it was that Romeo was the one with the pickle juice and Cana was having fun with her alcohol just like always. There was no way Cana would ever stop with her drinking, right?

"Psh. That's such an old addiction." Romeo laughed slightly. Yeah, it was rather hard to believe, but Cana had been clean for a while as far as he knew. Of course the boy didn't really know everything about her life. Oh, and there was also his slight concern over why Asuka knew the word booze and could actively use it in a sentence appropriately.

"Yeah, I moved on from it like months ago. I've just been drinking this stuff in secret." Cana scoffed, although she knew what she was saying wasn't exactly the truth. Sure, she had cut back a lot, but some habits were just too hard to kick. Drinking was one of them, but Asuka and Romeo really didn't need to know that… Did they?

"Why are you guys inviting me to join you though?" Asuka suddenly remembered how this whole conversation started to begin with. Why had they wanted her to come over to the depressing sulking corner anyway?

Cana looked at the girl in confusion. Shouldn't she have been able to get what was going on from the news board earlier? "You got a national holiday in your honor. Isn't it embarrassing?"

"No. I think it's really awesome!" Asuka smiled brightly. Whoever had gotten the holiday for her (she knew it was her dad) must've put a lot of work into it, meaning they cared quite a bit. Besides, a holiday meant everyone had to do what she said.

"Huh?" Cana and Romeo both looked on in confusion. The holidays were embarrassing, and there was no way anyone could deny that. So why was this other girl telling them it really wasn't as bad as they thought?

"And he even made day one have some sort of silent hour for Wakaba's daughter."

"Frick, I forgot about Sara!" Cana looked super upset after hearing Asuka speak. She and the girl had never been close, but Sara had spent a bit of time around the guild when she was younger. No one really ever remembered the girl so it suddenly made sense why she didn't wish to join the Fairy Tail guild.

"It's not like she was your childhood best friend! I should be the one who's upset!" Romeo was rather bitter about this. Sara really had been his best friend growing up- their fathers had made sure of it. But the girl was just so forgettable, and it filled the boy with self-loathing. What kind of loon forgot their old best friend every other day?

"Romeo, you're inebriated. Calm yourself down." Cana decided it was time to throw in the towel. Romeo was being rather unlike his normal chipper self at the moment, and she knew it was her fault. He needed to be cut off at all costs.

"It's just pickle juice, Cana. There's no reason I should even be slightly inebriated." Romeo sighed deeply, assuming Cana had been confused. She was probably still used to having drinking buddies, not him.

"Okay, well we ran out of pickle juice about an hour ago. I'm kind of surprised you didn't notice the change in taste." Cana laughed at Romeo's face as the boy went to check the liquid. Yes, it was in fact booze. She and Romeo had been consuming so much pickle juice lately that her stash got depleted much quicker than usual. So yeah, they had transitioned beverages sometime in the previous few hours.

"I'm so frustrated that I actually don't feel any influence from the world right now." Romeo looked shocked once again, but also defeated. He hadn't been very happy in the days since getting his own national holiday, and apparently now he was going numb to everything except for his own thought and emotions.

"Okay. I'm just gonna cut you off now." Cana hesitantly reached for his glass. She had never seen Romeo like this and was a bit frightened.

"That would probably be best."

* * *

An excited little girl just simply could not contain her joy that morning when she entered the guildhall. Jumping up and down happily, she read the news board, only to become more enthusiastic about life. There on the board, was an article about Fiore's newest holiday, Asuka Week, a time dedicated to celebrating her very own existence. "Asuka Week is going to be amazing!"

"What do you mean?" The guild all looked at the little girl after Lucy asked her question. Cana and Romeo had taken their respective holidays rather harshly. Seeing Asuka so excited about her own was both shocking and relieving.

Asuka's smile beamed even brighter than before. Like honestly guys, she could have blinded someone with how happy she was. Turning to look at both Lucy and Natsu, she spoke. "Well you guys will have to do whatever I say, and no using Happy to get out of it this time."

"But-" While thankful she actually had not gone blind, Lucy could not believe what this kid just said. Her protest had been an accident, having been struck by flashbacks of the last time Asuka was in charge of what she did. It really only made sense she would argue.

"No buts. Lucy you cheated last time." Asuka's face became extremely serious as she uttered this statement. There was no way Lucy was ever going to be able to work her way out of what the girl had planned. And I mean, Happy looked rather relieved after hearing he couldn't be used as an escape this time around.

"Fine, but nothing weird."The blonde woman sighed deeply. It was already hard enough to argue with Asuka normally, and when the girl became determined it was even worse. Lucy wondered how that had happened seeing as how her father was quite the pushover.

"Happy, are you okay!?" Natsu interrupted Lucy's sad thoughts. Happy was over in his little spot at the table crying. It was exaggerated crying as well, with tears flying every which way. The sight was concerning considering his relief moments ago.

"Why wouldn't I be? My beak is safe and my OTP might actually have a chance! I love Asuka Week!" The cat looked at the questioning gazes with a shocked expression. He seriously had no idea why they looked so concerned about his situation. I mean, why wouldn't he be happy about the upcoming holiday?

"But you're crying." Okay yeah, Natsu did have a good point. Crying traditionally meant sadness, that much he could understand. The pinkette was clearly concerned for such a reason.

"Happy tears, guys. They're happy tears." Happy had sighed before speaking. He was overjoyed, yes, but having to explain himself once again was frustrating. After he had expressed his excitement earlier, the source of his tears really should have just been assumed. But alas, these children just simply did not understand he wasn't sad.

"Well of course they are, they belong to you." Right, Natsu was a bit of an idiot, and yes, that may have been Happy's bitterness and frustration thinking, but either way he had almost forgotten the extent of his friend's mental capabilities. No wonder this conversation was taking place.

"I think he meant it like the emotion, Natsu." Lucy sighed quietly as she explained what was going on to him. Lucy acknowledged the fact that he wasn't a complete idiot, but it sure did seem like it at the moment.

Realization dawned on the pinkette. "Riiight."

* * *

 **A/N: Once again, we're super sorry for the wait! Inspiration is running low as school eats away at more and more of our lives so if anyone has any ideas then please share! So either the next chapter or chapter ten is going to have a reveal. Tell us what you think would be better so we can actually make a decision about it!**

 **Also, do we have any Bleach fans out there? Because do we have a gift for you!**

 ***Cue dramatic music* From the creators of Dragon Stop Pickle Shop and The Wedding comes a brand new tale: A Currently Untitled Work. After a few run ins with the new and improved Cool Central-46, we find many of our favorite characters pardoned for their crimes and welcomed back into the Seireitei. The joy of reuniting with lost convicts spread everywhere, and into personal lives in particular. So when Momo Hinamori, happily involved in her own relationship, comes across two of her very single friends only so many things could have happened. Now join us as we attend a blind wedding. Oh, and don't forget to bring a date, Momo has made them mandatory! *End dramatic song***

 **So I mean check it out if any of you are ever in the mood! The thing won't be posted for a while though seeing as how school drains us of all life and inspiration, not to mention motivation. And also, it is a pure crack fic, just like everything we make**!


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